Dark Light

Something else that pleased me was that I could also see the rhythmic flare of Sanibel Lighthouse, far, far down the beach. The lighthouse had been built in the 1880s during the era of train barons: a tower of steel rails, one hundred feet high, and capped with a crystal lens.

Until the storm, it hadn’t been visible from this section of beach.

As the music was ending, Tomlinson appeared on the balcony. He wore a white linen jacket, and slacks he’d bought at the consignment store on Palm Ridge Road, his favorites. There was a last alto flourish on the piano, and then a woman appeared, her hair silver in the moonlight.

His mystery woman. Finally.

The woman was thin as a reed in her sequined gown. She moved elegantly, like her music. Elegantly…but with a measured slowness that I associate with injury, or old age. It was incongruous with the way the gown hung on her body, the sleek contours, and also incongruous with what happened next: the woman stopped, held her hands up, palms outward—an invitation to Tomlinson. There was no music, but she wanted to dance.

For a few seconds longer, I watched as they joined and began to sway, dancing to the cadence of storm waves and a pulsing lighthouse beacon.

Their shadows were a single vertical stripe on the house’s gray shingles, elongated by moonlight.

I crossed the lab to get a rack of test tubes. Returned to the artifacts, and, once again, found myself staring at the death’s-head.

Why?

I thought about it for a moment, trying to pinpoint the allure. It seemed important that the attraction be defined—another compunction not easily understood.

Part of the fascination was the historical linkage: days that would live in infamy; boogie-woogie bugle boys who battled their way to the gates of gas chamber horrors.

There was an underlying component, though. A more intimate association.

What?

I leaned to focus, letting the nearby cigarette lighter, and bronze eagle blur. I’m not a fanciful person. I had to consciously will my imagination to wander.

Was it the design?

Yes. The medal’s design had something to do with it. The skull had a hint of smile showing above the diamond swastika. Smiling as it screamed. It was a design that celebrated the killing of one’s enemies. It seemed to encourage the action while depersonalizing the act. It hinted that, to participate, was to be part of a joyous brotherhood.

There was a wink in the death’s-head’s smile. A secret shared by few.

That secret; the brotherhood—I know both. Knew them better than I could admit. I am a marine biologist. But I’ve done other work in my life, too. Clandestine work in South America, Indonesia, Southeast Asia. In the world’s most dangerous places, a man who studies fish does not invite suspicion.

I have traveled the world. I still do.

The death-head’s secret, and its brotherhood—I was more than aware. I was a colleague.

The association with the Third Reich was unsettling until I reminded myself of a core precept: I belonged to a just brotherhood. There was a moral partition.

Or was there?

I felt a gathering uneasiness. The association was repellent; the connection stronger than I cared to explore.

Instead, I chose to focus on detail: twenty-six diamonds. Silver filigree.

Presumably, a man awarded such a thing was an exalted member of the brotherhood and good at it. Good at killing. Or delegating. As I’d told Jeth, this wasn’t an ornament worn by pretenders. It was real. It was murder’s totem.

I pictured the badge pinned to the chest of a German officer. The bronze eagle, too. An award ceremony with drums. Black boots goose-stepping, a Nazi war hero at attention, insulated by ritual as his homeland self- destructed…

My imagination faltered. The allure, though, remained.

What else was on that wreck?

What had Jeth found, out there in the Gulf?

I went to the VHF marine radio mounted on the wall. Locals communicated on channel 68 and that’s where I keep the dial, squelch low. Now, though, I switched to the weather channel, then knelt to open storage cabinets. From a shelf, I took a low-voltage transformer. It was book-sized, with a meter, a rheostat, and alligator clips, red and black, similar to jumper cables.

Near the tray of sodium hydroxide, I plugged the transformer into the wall and tested it. Most of my electronics hadn’t survived the storm. The transformer worked fine.

I messed with the transformer’s rheostat as I listened to the mutant, computerized voice of the weather channel:

From Cedar Key to Cape Sable, and fifty miles off shore: Small craft advisory issued, small craft warnings anticipated. Tomorrow, winds out of the southeast, twenty to twenty-five knots, decreasing after sunset, and calming to twenty knots on Saturday.

For the lower keys and Florida Bay, a hurricane watch is in effect…

Tomorrow would not be a good day to dive Jeth’s wreck. The next day, Saturday, would be better. With hurricanes building in the Caribbean, though, the weather would soon worsen. It would probably remain windy and rough for the next several weeks. Off Grand Cayman Island, there was a hurricane gaining strength. Another was headed for the western tip of Cuba, and a third storm, off Nicaragua, was forming.

Should we dive tomorrow, or Saturday? We could. Twenty-knot winds weren’t dangerous, but it would be miserable in open water. Bang our way out to the wreck at first light, twelve miles of salt spray and abuse, then anchor in heavy seas. Get the hell knocked out of us just to explore a wreck by touch, feeling around in the murk?

Exasperating.

I’d left a phone message for a Key West friend who’s a marine archaeologist. He works with the late, great Mel Fisher’s treasure salvage organization, restoring artifacts brought up from two of the richest galleons ever discovered—the Atocha, and the Ana Maria.

Mel and his team had spent years looking for those wrecks. Finally found the Atocha’s brass cannon forty miles from Key West, in the shallows of a World War II bombing range called the Quicksands. He’d taken great delight in showing friends bars of silver that had been snagged by impatient fishermen. The fishermen had broken off fish hooks and lures, indifferent to what lay below.

Jeth had not been impatient. He’d finessed the treasure he’d snagged to the surface.

If anyone knew the best way to preserve delicate metals, it was my friend Dr. Corey.

Rather than wait for his call, though, I had decided to move ahead with the cleaning procedure on my own. I told myself it wasn’t because I couldn’t rush out to the wreck and explore. Told myself I wasn’t behaving like some overeager kid; that I was willing to wait patiently until my archaeologist pal offered his advice.

The artifacts, though, couldn’t wait—I told myself that, too. The unknown objects, still clustered on the cable, required immediate attention. Minute by minute, they were deteriorating.

Partial truths make the most palatable lies.

The cleaning process is called electrolytic reduction. It sounds complicated, but it’s not. It’s based on the same galvanic principle used to make flashlight batteries: Dissimilar metals interact electrically. It also explains why outboard motors disintegrate unless protected by zinc plates.

To continue, I needed a couple of stainless steel rods, a roll of copper wire, a six-volt battery, and…what else?

I was rummaging through the storage cupboards when I felt the pilings of my fish house resonate. Realized a boat was docking outside.

Looked and there he was. Tomlinson.