Port Starbird (Storm Ketchum Adventures)

by Garrett Dennis

  He suddenly became cognizant of the fact that, since his confrontation with Ingram earlier this week, he hadn't been having any more panic attacks - and in fact, today he hadn't even broken a sweat so far, not with Kari or Mario or the Captain anyway. It seemed he might be getting a little better at handling stressful situations and thinking on his feet, and better as well at sneaking around and being duplicitous. But while that latter might have impressed his parents, he wasn't entirely sure it was a good thing.

  It also belatedly occurred to him that maybe he could have investigated the dump site on Saturday, when the Captain took his dive charter out. Mario's boat hadn't gone too far out last night, only a few miles east out of Oregon Inlet from what he'd seen on the GPS, so there was an excellent chance of the site being well within the depth limit for recreational diving. He knew from the Captain's charts that one would have to sail farther out than that to get to a canyon, and farther still to finally leave the relatively shallow continental shelf behind and enter the realm of the true abyss.

  In either of those cases those drums would have been virtually unreachable, and would almost certainly never be seen again by human eyes. He wondered whether Mick and Mario were ignorant of these facts, or if they couldn't go out that far for some reason, or if they were just plain lazy. Maybe Mario's boat, old as it was and not very well maintained, no longer had the range, or maybe it wasn't reliable enough to trust it going out that far; or maybe Mario simply wasn't a great navigator.

  But the feasibility of the Saturday plan would depend on the dump site's proximity to the planned dive site or sites, which he'd neglected to ask about, and on cooperation from both the Captain and the divers. And most of the divers who came here wanted to dive on the historic shipwrecks of the Graveyard, not on a heap of barrels - not to mention they might be concerned about their safety, and rightfully so. Maybe as the second dive of the day? But even if they agreed to do it and they found the drums, one or more of them would probably be as outraged as he himself was, and they'd want to report the crime immediately - whereas an alternative idea was now beginning to take shape in the back of his mind, something he hadn't considered earlier and which might accomplish more than one objective. And if it could, it would require continued secrecy on his part, at least for now. He'd have to look into that further when he got home.

  Although he was anxious to get all of the items checked off his list, he experienced a pang of guilt when the dog greeted him at the door. The dog was more energetic and impish than usual, sticking his head into Ketch's backpack and coming out with one of the granola bars, which Ketch had to chase him around the room to retrieve. After Ketch had let him out and back in again, the dog went immediately to where his leash and Ketch's walking stick hung on a peg in the kitchen, and sat there wagging and intently staring at Ketch.

  "I'm sorry, boy," he said, squatting and giving the dog a hug. "I've been neglecting you, haven't I?" He didn't want to take the time to drive the dog to the beach, which was probably what he was angling for, but he decided he should at least take him out back and play with him again, as he'd done the day before. It wouldn't take long, and he'd have to change into a swimsuit anyway before he took the TBD out. "I'll make it up to you later, I promise," he said, then stood and proclaimed, "Let's get ready for a playtime!"

  If the dog was disappointed, he didn't show it. He paced excitedly and panted while Ketch changed, then eagerly followed Ketch down to the back yard. They went through the same basic drill as they had the previous day, with the football and the frisbee and the water-play, and the dog behaved as though it were the first time for any of it, as he always did. Ketch knew he wasn't just meeting the dog's needs for attention, stimulation, and exercise, but also satisfying a characteristic craving for routine, and his guilt abated as he saw he was succeeding on all counts.

  When they went back in and he'd gotten the dog settled with another bone, he draped a beach towel over a chair at the kitchen table, sat down, and booted his laptop. The first order of business was to verify the depth of the ocean at the dump site. Since he still didn't have his own set of coastal navigational charts, he'd have to find an appropriate chart on the web. The NOAA had an online chart viewer that should do the trick.

  Yes, here was a good one... He consulted his notebook for the coordinates and zoomed in on the section of the chart he needed. As nearly as he could tell, the depth should be no more than sixty feet, tops, and likely less. That was certainly doable, as the maximum recommended recreational depth was a hundred and thirty. Beyond that was tec diving territory, and he was not a trained technical diver.

  And now, while he was at it, what about Tibbleson Construction? He unfortunately had less luck this time. All he could find through Google were phone directory-type pages, and while some of the companies listed there had their own websites, they didn't often name names; and Tibbleson was no exception.

  He needed to know who ran the show there. How could he find out? He heard his cell phone ring from the other room; he'd put it in his backpack so he wouldn't forget it later, and when he got to it he saw it was Kari. He considered answering the call, then decided against it. Let her think he was out cleaning his boat or whatever for now - he didn't want to be interrupted, or worse yet talked into doing something that might force him to scuttle his plans for the day. After all, there are schedules to be maintained, even in Colombia, he thought in a Hollywood Spanish accent. Since the Sea Dog wouldn't be open yet, he hoped she wouldn't just show up here unannounced again.

  He could see she was leaving him a voice message. He'd check it later. Meanwhile, he went to his desk and found the most recent letter he'd received from Ingram. The phone was free by the time he returned to the kitchen, so he tapped in one of the numbers he found on the letter.

  As he'd anticipated, he got some kind of receptionist or secretary on the line. Implying he was a client, he inquired how he might get hold of the owner of Tibbleson Construction, which had been recommended to him for renovation work at the implicitly expensive beach house he implied he'd recently bought through HatterasMann Realty, and did they ever use this company themselves? The girl replied yes and that would be Bob Ingram, who also ran the realty, and who was not in the office at this time and would he like to leave a message? Ketch thanked her, politely declined to identify himself, and said he'd call back another time.

  So, he'd covered three of the four items on his list now - and now he was a private eye, wasn't he? Right, he thought, sure. He wondered if one needed a license to hang a PI shingle in North Carolina. Anyway, the pieces were starting to fall into place. Next on the agenda was verifying the dump site and getting some more photos, which would enable him to check the last item off his list. He moved to the guest bedroom and started assembling the gear he'd need to accomplish that.

  ~ ~ ~

  11. He sailed on, with hope and confidence freshening like a rising breeze.

  There were a few scattered light clouds as Ketch motored up the sound toward Oregon Inlet, but none of the long white plumes the old mariners had called mare's tails, and none that looked like fish scales. The sky had been a gorgeous panoply of reds and oranges at sunset the night before and hadn't been earlier this morning, and the moon hadn't been ringed last night. His wind sock indicated a light westerly, which he estimated at about five knots. Finally, the birds he was seeing weren't perched or flying low, which could indicate decreasing barometric pressure and changing weather.

  And just to be sure, he'd also checked the weather report on his marine radio. So he'd probably be okay out there today weather-wise at least, which was good because taking anything smaller than a twenty-footer out to sea around here could be iffy. But his seventeen-footer was adequately powered and stable enough for nearshore sailing under reasonable conditions and mild current. It should also have range enough, and he'd brought a container of extra fuel for backup.

  As for the rest of this little outing, he didn't need a specialty diving class to know he'd be viol
ating some cardinal rules today. For starters he'd be diving solo, without a buddy who'd at least theoretically be able to rescue him if he had any trouble. He also didn't have a redundant air supply other than the half-dozen breaths he might get from his Spare Air, and he'd be leaving his boat unattended in open water when he descended to survey the dump site.

  But he had after a modicum of internal conflict decided to follow one rule, that being to file a 'flight plan' with someone back on shore just in case. Though he had a radio, that wouldn't help if he couldn't use it for some reason. So he'd sent the Captain a message on his phone asking him to come get him if he hadn't called in by a certain time, and he'd given the Captain the coordinates - but still no explanation. Poor old salt... The Captain had always been a good friend, he deserved to be treated better than Ketch had treated him this morning, and he was after all a bit of an outlaw himself. Ketch was fairly certain he could and would keep his mouth shut, his public persona notwithstanding - he just needed to find the time to fill him in. And Kari as well, he remembered.

  Speaking of that particular devil, he'd forgotten to listen to her phone message. He'd meant to check it right after she'd left it, but he'd gotten caught up in his snooping and then in packing his gear; and he'd again meant to do it when he'd sent the Captain's message, but he'd put that off until departure time and then set out immediately after. He felt bad now about forgetting, and he hoped it hadn't been something urgent.

  In his defense, since he was a competent and (usually) conscientious diver, packing for a dive trip was a highly organized affair; one didn't just jam whatever was handy into a bag and hope for the best. In his case the dive bag was also a backpack; though oversized, he found it easier to handle than a duffel-type bag. Working from both a written checklist and a detailed step-by-step mental visualization of the planned dive from start to finish, he'd ensured that he packed every essential item, big and small, bar none. It was always important to do all that, but obviously even more so when there'd be no one else around to borrow anything from. And he'd wanted to leave as little time as possible between the Captain receiving his message and himself getting underway. But he knew those still weren't great excuses; he'd have to do better.

  There might be no cell reception at the dive site later, so he decided to start doing better right now. He idled the outboard to cut down on the noise and, still keeping an eye on the GPS, extracted his phone from the dry bag that also held his wallet and various other landlubber flotsam. He relaxed as he listened to the message - she was thinking of closing at six instead of seven, that was all, nothing to worry about except that he hoped he'd make it there on time. He stowed the phone and throttled back up.

  He'd deal with that, and all the rest of it, later. Right now he needed to focus on his GPS, his compass, and the water ahead of the boat. He shouldn't have a problem navigating the shallow sound with the TBD unless he got truly unlucky, since it had only a nine-inch draft, but he thought he should still keep a close watch.

  The TBD... He silently apologized to her once again. When he'd gotten the boat he'd had to register and name it, and he'd been in some kind of creative trough at the time and hadn't been able to dredge up anything that really resonated with him. He'd figured he could just rename her later, but then he'd learned it was considered bad luck to change the name of a boat. That was of course just more superstitious nonsense, so he'd still change it when he got around to it. Probably.

  With the inlet coming up soon, his thoughts turned to the single waypoint he'd found on Mario's GPS. If Mario had participated in more than one dumping operation, could that mean they'd always deposited their nefarious cargo in the same general area? If so, that would be both better for the environment and convenient for those who'd be involved with the cleanup Ketch assumed would eventually happen. But it could also mean other boats had been used in the past and Mario had only done it once, or that Mario had done it more than once but not very often.

  Well, he'd find out soon enough, some of it anyway. It wouldn't take too long to get through the inlet, and then he could go almost full throttle. Once he did that, reaching the waypoint would be a matter of minutes.

  He made it through the inlet without mishap and wound her up. When the GPS told him he was at the waypoint, he throttled down and slowly circled the area, trying to see if he could eyeball anything below. But the visibility wasn't good enough here for that, so he picked a spot, cut the engine, and dropped anchor.

  He counted the intervals on the braided anchor rode as he fed it into the water. When the anchor hit bottom and the line went slack, he was able to estimate a depth of about forty feet, give or take. He wouldn't need to consult a dive table or his dive computer for forty feet; he'd empty his tank before he reached the no-decompression time limit for that depth.

  But even though the dive tables already incorporated safety margins, each person's physiology was a little different, and the risk of decompression sickness, or 'the bends' as it was commonly known, increased with age, among other factors. So for a safer dive profile he'd round up to fifty feet, which he knew carried an eighty-minute limit on bottom time; he wouldn't remain at depth more than seventy minutes; and he'd make a five-minute safety stop at fifteen feet on his ascent. And of course he'd use his dive computer to track depth and time.

  He hoped that would be enough time to find the drums, if he hadn't landed right on top of them. He had only the one tank, so there'd likely be no trying again at another spot. He paused a moment to reevaluate the dive conditions. The surface was fairly calm, it looked like the weather was holding, and things were generally pretty quiet out here today. So, this was it.

  The first thing he did was set out the ladder. He could manage to get back aboard this kind of boat later without it, but ever since he'd seen the film Open Water 2 he'd made it a habit to take care of the ladder before he did anything else. It would be profoundly embarrassing to him if he ever ended up stranded like those dumb-asses had, when they'd all gone snorkeling off their yacht at the same time and no one had thought to set out the ladder.

  Then he began to don his gear, starting with the uppermost items in the bag and working his way down to the bottom, having methodically packed the bag earlier in the reverse of the donning order.

  For a wetsuit, he'd brought his 2mm jumpsuit. He probably could have gotten by with his shorty today, since he didn't chill as easily as the locals did - but even though the water temp was in the eighties at the surface, that was still lower than body temperature, and it would be cooler at depth. Though it was a hot day up top and he was sweating now, he knew enough of his body heat would dissipate during the dive that he'd be glad to get back up into the warm sun by the end of it. Plus the long sleeves and legs, and the light gloves he'd also wear, would protect him from abrasions and jellyfish stings, if he should happen to encounter any of those.

  While he was suiting up he decided to violate another safety rule - he wouldn't fly his 'diver down' flag today. There were no other boats anywhere in sight at the moment, but in case that changed while he was underwater, he thought it might be wise to avoid advertising the fact that someone was diving here. He'd be careful on his ascent as always; he wouldn't get run over.

  When he was otherwise ready, he carried his fins over to where he'd left the tank racked despite having attached the regulators and buoyancy compensator to it earlier. Although it was essentially weightless in the water, as Kari had pointed out this kind of tank weighed about forty pounds on the surface when filled with air, and you didn't want that rolling or sliding around loose on deck. The BC's integrated weights were already in place, and the accessories Ketch would need were already clipped to the BC as well. He slipped it and the fins on, inflated the BC halfway, double-checked his gear again, glanced one more time at the ladder, and did a back roll off the port gunwale.

  He swam to the anchor line, deflated the BC, and began descending down the line, clearing his ears every few feet along the way as the ambient pressure steadily
increased. As he neared the sandy bottom he made himself neutrally buoyant to avoid stirring up sediment and reducing visibility. He noted his depth was forty-two feet at the moment; it could vary throughout the dive, but the computer would keep track of it.

  First he checked on the anchor. The Danforth fluke was the best kind for this type of bottom and it looked as secure as could be expected, but he clipped the end of the line from the wreck reel he was carrying to the anchor line so he'd always be connected to it. He didn't see any drums so far, so he'd have to do a search; and if the anchor dragged, there was no one up top to chase him down if he got separated from the boat. The viz looked to be about twenty feet, so he wasn't shocked that he hadn't seen anything yet. This wasn't the kind of visibility featured on postcards and in travel brochures; that was rare this close to shore. But it would do.

  He started executing a circular search pattern centered on the anchor, and switched on his dive light. It wouldn't penetrate much farther, if at all, than his eye could see, but it would provide more color contrast and make it easier to discern objects such as the drums, which could be half-buried in the sand or silted over. And if there were some that had been there a while, they could be encrusted with marine growths.

  Sunlight in seawater was progressively weakened by absorption and scattering as the depth increased, and colors were steadily lost to view as a result. Red, orange, and yellow were the first to go, being completely absorbed by thirty feet; after that everything was shades of green, blue, and violet. The sea usually appears blue-green to our eyes because those wavelengths penetrate the deepest and are the ones that are scattered back to us. Shining a white light on an object at depth restores its true colors.

  He'd reeled out about forty feet of line when he found the first clutch. That's apropos, he thought - a clutch of toxic eggs. There were a half-dozen of them clustered fairly tightly. He could tell these were not the ones from last night, because coral had started to accrete on them, and that took some time.