Riptide

'What a hot hand you have!' she cried.

'The pleasure is mine,' Hatch replied belatedly.

'And you are the brilliant Harvard doctor that Gerard has been talking about,' she said, gazing into his face. 'He likes you very much, you know.'

Hatch found himself blushing. 'Glad to hear it.' He had never really thought about whether Neidelman liked him, but he found himself unaccountably pleased to hear it. He caught, just out of the corner of his eye, a glance of hatred from Streeter.

'I am glad you are aboard. It saves me the trouble of tracking you down.'

Hatch frowned his lack of understanding.

'I will be locating the old pirate encampment, excavating it.' She gave him a shrewd look. 'You own this island, non? Where would you camp, if you had to spend three months on it?'

Hatch thought for a moment. 'Originally, the island was heavily wooded in spruce and oak. I imagine they would have cut a clearing on the leeward side of the island. On the shore, near where their boats were moored.'

'The lee shore? But would that not mean they could be seen from the mainland on clear days?'

'Well, I suppose so, yes. This coast was already settled in 1696, though sparsely.'

'And they would need to keep watch on the windward shore, n'est-ce pas? For any shipping that might chance on them.'

'Yes, that's right,' Hatch said, secretly nettled. If she knows all the answers, then why is she asking me? 'The main shipping route between Halifax and Boston went right past here, across the Gulf of Maine.' He paused. 'But if this coast was settled, how would they have hidden nine ships?'

'I too thought of that question. There is a very deep harbor two miles up the coast, shielded by an island.'

'Black Harbor,' said Hatch.

'Exactement.'

'That makes sense,' Hatch replied. 'Black Harbor wasn't settled until the mid seventeen hundreds. The work crew and Macallan could have lived on the island, while the ships sheltered unseen in the harbor.'

'The windward side, then!' Bonterre said. 'You've been most helpful. Now I must get ready.' Any lingering annoyance Hatch felt melted away under the archaeologist's dazzling smile. She balled up her hair and slid the hood over it, then donned her mask. The other diver sidled over to adjust her tanks, introducing himself as Sergio Scopatti.

Bonterre glanced up and down the man's suit appraisingly, as if seeing it for the first time. 'Grande merde du noir,' she muttered fervently. 'I did not know Speedo made wetsuits.'

'Italians make everything fashionable,' Scopatti laughed. 'And molto svelta.'

'How's my video working?' Bonterre called over her shoulder to Streeter, tapping a small camera mounted on her mask.

Streeter ran his hand down a bank of switches and a video screen popped to life on the control console, showing the jiggling, grinning face of Scopatti.

'Look somewhere else,' said Scopatti to Bonterre, 'or you'll break your camera.'

'I shall look at the doctor then,' said Bonterre, and Hatch saw his own face appear on the screen.

'That wouldn't just break the camera, it would implode the lens,' Hatch said, wondering why this woman kept him at a loss for words.

'Next time, I get the comm set,' said Scopatti, in a joking whine.

'Never,' said Bonterre. 'I am the famous archaeologist. You are just cheap hired Italian labor.'

Scopatti grinned, not at all put out.

Neidelman's voice broke in: 'Five minutes to the turn of the tide. Is the Naiad in position?'

Streeter acknowledged.

'Mr. Wopner, is the program running properly?'

'No problemo, Captain,' came the nasal voice over the channel. 'Running fine now. Now that I'm here, I mean.'

'Understood. Dr. Magnusen?'

'The pumps are primed and ready to go, Captain. The crew reports that the dye bomb is suspended over the Water Pit, and the remote's in place.'

'Excellent. Dr. Magnusen, you'll drop the bomb on my signal.'

The people on the Naiad fell silent. A pair of guillemots whirred past, flying just above the surface of the water. On the far side of the island, Hatch could make out the Grampus, riding the even swell just beyond the ledges. The air of excitement, of something about to happen, increased.

'Mean high tide,' came Neidelman's quiet voice. 'Start the pumps.'

The throb of the pumps came rumbling across the water. As if in response, the island groaned and coughed with the reversal of the tide. Hatch shuddered involuntarily; if there was one thing that still gave him a shiver of horror, it was that sound.