“Did Gertie run off and become a pirate?” I asked.
“Those sea dogs didn’t allow women out on the ocean. Gertie offered shelter to Lemuel and his gang on her father’s property, in an old cow barn,” Becca said. “Let’s just say he took advantage of the poor girl’s hospitality.”
“I’ve watched a lot of those old movies with my mom,” I said. “The ones where the tough guys show up needing help, and promising to change their ways, then ride off into the sunset while their girlfriends are left to milk the cows and darn everybody’s socks.”
“Well, Devlin Quick, your mother and your aunt Janice and all the women like them broke that mold, you know,” Becca said, laughing with me. “There’ll be no darning socks for you.”
“Yeah, but it sounds like Gertie Thaw got the short end of the stick,” I said. “I bet she got her heart broken by that pirate.”
“Could be, but I’ve told you all I know,” Becca said. “When you get old enough, you can research the story and write a book about it.”
“Maybe there’s already a book in the local library about the story. Mom’s always encouraging me to expand my horizons by reading books that teach me things.”
“Blaine’s always been a bit ahead of the curve in that regard,” Becca said. “I’d still be pushing Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm as your reading material. What makes you so interested in my storytelling today?”
“Here’s this pirate doubloon,” I said. “What if it actually belongs to the Thaws?”
“This coin is a really mysterious thing,” Booker said. “If we can figure out who it belongs to and how it got here, we’d be doing something good for the people who lost it.”
Zee came rushing back out onto the porch, carrying a black suede pouch with a long string tie.
“Did Gertie ever get married?” I asked. “Did she have any children?”
“No to both questions,” Becca said. “That’s what I’ve been told.”
“But there were a lot more descendants in the Thaw family, weren’t there?” Booker asked. “Are any of them still out on the property in Chilmark?”
I knew what my partner in crime was thinking. What if there was buried treasure from the time Lemuel Kyd had hidden in Gertie’s cow barn?
“There are Thaws here and about,” Becca said. “They sold off that old farm a few years back. Some film producer from Hollywood bought it and started to put up a mega-mansion. But there doesn’t ever seem to be anyone there and I’m not sure the building was ever completed.”
Booker looked at me and winked. Maybe a visit to the old Thaw homestead would be a fun adventure. Maybe there were more doubloons to be found!
Zee had dumped his bag of pirate booty on the porch. There were fifteen or twenty coins, most of them the size of the doubloon we’d found on the beach. Some of his treasure was the color of silver, and some pieces were a mixture of silver and bands of gold.
I kneeled down to touch them as Zee spread them out on the deck.
“Where did you get these?” I asked. “They look almost good enough to be real.”
“Aren’t they cool?” Zee said, squealing with excitement.
“Keep your voice down, young man. Everybody passing by will think I’m harboring a pirate,” his grandmother said, teasing.
“They’re reproductions,” Booker said. “Feel how much lighter they are than our doubloon.”
I picked up four of Zee’s coins and held them in one hand, with the paper bag in my other hand. Those four didn’t even equal the weight of our one antique piece.
“Becca bought them for me at the shop at the Whydah Museum on the Cape.”
“That’s true. I certainly did,” she said.
“What’s the Whydah Museum?” I asked.
“The Whydah was a slave ship out of Africa in the eighteenth century, built to carry slaves to the Caribbean,” Becca said. “On its way back across the Atlantic, a buccaneer known as Black Sam raided the ship, freed the remaining slaves, and took over the galleon as a pirate ship. The Whydah sank not far from here, close to Cape Cod, and there’s a wonderful museum named for it that I’ve taken Zee to see.”
“That’s a really great collection,” I said to Zee, getting to my feet. “You’re lucky to have it.”
He was absorbed in the coins now, ordering them in a single line from the edge of the porch down the steps to the sidewalk.
“You better hang on to those,” Booker said. “Don’t be showing off that you have all these coins. People on the street might think they’re real.”
“That’s what I want them to think,” Zee said, raising his voice again. “They’re real coins and I’m a real pirate!”
Several passersby, on their way to the Inkwell with beach chairs and umbrellas, picked up their heads when they heard Zee shout. Becca just waved at them and smiled.
“Why don’t you go for a bike ride?” she asked.
The island had amazing bike trails that kept you off the roadway, parallel to the ocean and alongside the pond where older kids paddleboarded and kitesailed.
“Good idea,” Booker said. “Will you hold on to our treasure?”
“Your doubloon will be my responsibility,” Becca said, taking the crumpled bag from me. “Do you mind if I throw away the bag?”
I practically gasped. “Please don’t do that!” I said. “It’s all part of the experiment, so I’ll need to keep it. Even the bag is evidence, now. And you can’t touch the coin without gloves, Becca. I mean, in case we need to have scientists perform DNA tests on it.”
Becca was headed for the screen door. “Your treasure is safe with me.”
Zee was scrambling to get his coins back in the bag. “How about me?” he asked. “Can I come, too?”
“Of course you can,” I said. “But leave your coins at home.”
Zee followed Becca to the door, held it open, and threw his bag of make-believe doubloons onto the living room sofa.
Booker walked to the garage and opened the door. There was a bike rack with six ten-speeds for family and friends to use, and a shorter one that belonged to Zee.
“Let’s go toward Edgartown,” he said. “There’s a hot-dog stand near the pond, so we can watch the guys sail for a while until it’s time for lunch.”
“How can you even think about food?” I asked, pointing my handlebars in the opposite direction. “Why don’t we go to the lighthouse now?”
“The lighthouse?” Booker said, groaning as he spoke. He was hungrier than he was curious.
Zee was with me. I knew he would be.
“Let’s find Artie Constant,” I said, pumping my pedals and letting the wind carry my words back to Booker. “If there are secrets to be told, he’s the man who knows them all.”
7
I let Zee lead the way, zipping around the edge of Ocean Park, past the police station, and then cruising by the marina, full of sail- and motorboats. He made a right turn at the small market and then the tall white lighthouse—surrounded by a well-tended area of grass and flowers—came into view.
We dismounted and parked our bikes in a rack near the entrance.
There was a large painted sign announcing our location: EAST CHOP LIGHTHOUSE. 1878.
“Wow. This place is really old,” Booker said.
“Unfortunately, it was built long after Lemuel Kyd was around,” I said, turning to Zee. “How do we find Mr. Constant?”
There was a NO TRESPASSING sign on the front door, with a notice that visitors were welcome every Sunday from 6–9 p.m. Adults have something about liking to see the sun set, I guess, and take pictures of it. It seems to be an activity they’ve got to do wherever they go.
“There’s a back entrance,” Zee said.
We followed him around the base of the lighthouse and stopped at a narrow panel that hardly looked wide enough to be a door.
/> Zee had been here before. That was obvious. He pulled up on the old metal handle and pushed in. Booker and I followed him over the threshold and into the dark base of the old structure.
“Mr. Constant?” Zee called out. “Artie?”
There was the sound of footsteps coming from way above our heads. I craned my neck to look up.
“Who goes there?” a deep voice grumbled at us.
“It’s me, sir, Ezekiel Lydem.”
“Ahoy, matey! Been missing you, Zee,” Constant said. “Climb on up here, son, and let’s have a look out at the ocean. See if we’ve got any scallywags coming ashore.”
“I’ve got my cousin Booker with me, okay?” Zee said, putting his hand on the banister and his foot on the first step. “And a friend of ours, too. A girl.”
“Why did you have to say that?” I asked. “It makes no difference at all.”
Zee shrugged. “Artie thinks girls are afraid of pirates.”
“That is so ridiculous,” I said. “Was Gertie Thaw afraid of Lemuel Kyd? Obviously not. Here we are centuries later. What have I got to be afraid of? And by the way, there are no pirates around here today.”
“I keep telling you that Dev isn’t afraid of much,” Booker said. “Rattlesnakes and scorpions, sure.”
He was thinking about my dinosaur dig in Montana last month.
“Come on, all of you,” Artie Constant said.
I glanced up again. The staircase was spiral-shaped, and it wound around and around again, as the steps got narrower and narrower. I couldn’t even see the platform where Artie must have been standing, it was so far above our heads. The tower was four or five stories high, and the only things inside it were hundreds of steps.
“Why don’t you ask him to come down,” I whispered to Zee.
“Because he’s up there,” Zee said. “You can practically see France from the top of the tower. What’s the point of being in the lighthouse if you can’t see all the ships?”
Booker started to laugh. “I forgot about heights,” he said. “Dev’s kinda skittish about heights, too.”
“I thought you said she isn’t afraid—” Zee started to say, turning to look at Booker.
“Of almost anything,” Booker said. “I forgot the almost.”
“Who have you brought to me?” Constant bellowed from above. “Your words echo up here, son. Seems like you have a lily-livered lass with you today.”
“That’s a low blow,” I said, putting my hand on the thin banister.
I thought of my grandmother Lulu’s advice, whenever she tried to get me over my personal stumbling blocks. Tackle your fear straight on, she would say to me. The only way to build courage is to look your fears in the eye.
I tilted my head and looked up at the top of the tower. “Cover my back, Booker, will you?”
Zee turned to face me from the step above. “What does Artie mean about your liver? Are you sick?”
I kept my voice low and leaned into his ear. “It means he’s trying to bully me, just for being a girl. Back in the Middle Ages, people believed that your liver was the source of courage. Lulu told me that after I read the expression in Macbeth. And if your liver was the color of a lily—you know, real pale and light—then it meant you were a coward.”
“Louder!” Constant said. “I couldn’t hear that.”
I kept a tight hold on the banister and took the lead from Zee. “I’m a lass all right, Mr. Constant, but you’ll be walking the plank if you have anything nasty to say to me when I reach your hideaway.”
I raced up the twisty staircase, keeping my eyes focused on the spotlight at the top of the building, on the inside. I never looked down. I didn’t want to think about how I would get out of this place when we were ready to go.
“Well then,” Artie Constant said, reaching out to take my hand and help me onto the circular platform that ringed the inside of the tower. “You were quick for a landlubber, weren’t you?”
“I am Quick. Devlin Quick, sir. Nice to meet you.”
“Any friend of Zee’s is a friend of mine,” Constant said as Zee burst past me and immediately went to press his nose against one of the windows.
“I’m Booker Dibble. Zee’s cousin,” Booker said.
Artie Constant rubbed his hands together and talked to Zee. “So why have you brought these sprogs to me?”
“Sprogs?” I asked, anticipating another insult.
“Calm down now, young lady,” Constant said. “It’s just captain’s talk for new recruits.”
“Look, sir,” I said. “I enjoyed reading Treasure Island as much as the next kid, but do we have to talk like sea dogs the whole time?”
Artie Constant laughed and leaned back against the iron railing. “Some of the guests like me to do that,” he said. “And Zee? Well, there must be some pirate blood in his veins. It’s just part of the game we play when he’s up here, scanning the horizon for any ships flying the Jolly Roger.”
“Pretty spectacular spot you’ve got up here,” Booker said, moving next to Zee to take in the view.
I shivered. It must have been quite a sight, in the old days, to see a skull and crossbones on a black flag flying high above the main deck of a ship—a sure sign of pirates approaching the Oak Bluffs harbor.
“Sergeant Wright suggested that you might be able to answer some questions for us,” I said. “She told us you’re an expert on pirates.”
Constant had thick white hair and a gray beard—a short one, but still messy enough that it looked as though a small bird could have nested in it. He pulled at the end of it while he answered me.
“I can’t really be an expert in anything, Devlin,” he said, picking up his telescope and moving toward one of the windows. “I grew up in this town but never even finished high school.”
“My mom’s got a law degree and Booker’s parents are both doctors,” I said, “but they don’t know the first thing about pirates. You probably know more than anyone on the Vineyard, the sergeant said. In my book, that makes you an expert.”
That remark seemed to please Artie Constant.
“Buccaneers and buried treasure,” he said. “I’ve been fascinated by both them things since I was Zee’s age. Maybe younger. If you think I can help you, then fire away with your questions.”
“Is it true that Lemuel Kyd came to Martha’s Vineyard to escape the Spanish ships that were trying to capture him?”
“That’s the lore that came down over the ages,” he said, “and I’ve got no reason to doubt it.”
“Was there any proof of his visit here?”
Constant put down his scope and tugged at his beard again. “Proof? Like you mean the kind that could hold up in a court of law?”
“That would be really cool to have.”
He shook his head from side to side. “Can’t say that I saw any of that, hard as I looked for it.”
“Tell us what you looked for,” I said.
Zee and Booker turned their heads to listen.
“Do you know about the first Captain Kidd?” Constant asked. “The more famous one? He was a Scotsman, named William.”
“Sure we do,” Booker said. “But what became of him?”
Zee jumped right in. “The British finally got him,” he said. “Took him to England and hung him from the gallows.”
I reached for my neck and rubbed it.
“There’s your expert,” Constant said, pointing at Zee. “Best student I ever had.”
“So when did Lemuel Kyd come along?” I asked. “I never heard of him until today.”
“Much later,” he said. “More than a century after William Kidd. Lemuel was English, and his country came against us in the War of 1812. Pirates were everywhere along the coast of the young United States then.”
“He was a copycat pirate,” Zee said. “He wanted to be just li
ke the first Captain Kidd, getting rich, hiding his money along the New England coast—”
“Probably looking for what the first Captain Kidd left along the way, at the very same time, in typical pirate fashion,” Constant said.
“—and maybe looking for a rich wife,” Zee went on. “Maybe like Gertie Thaw.”
“Gertie wasn’t rich, laddie,” Constant said to Zee, reaching out and putting a hand on his shoulder.
“Becca says the Thaws were land rich,” Zee said.
“Lemuel Kyd didn’t want land, matey,” Constant said, picking up his telescope again and extending it to its limit. “Didn’t have any use for it, except to put some gold and jewels under it until the coast was clear. Remember those pirates had stolen silks and calicoes, too, and rum from the Indies. They had plenty on board to barter with.”
“Did you ever believe there was treasure here, Mr. Constant?” Booker asked. “Did you ever dig for it?”
“Most surely I did.”
“Where, exactly?”
Constant’s belly shook as he laughed again. “Between just about every rock that the tip of a shovel could fit. There was a time in my youth, kids—almost eighty years ago, before there were mopeds and fast cars and jet planes coming to the Vineyard—that you could walk from one end of the island, in Edgartown, to the top of the great red clay cliffs in Gayhead.”
“Gayhead is called Aquinnah now,” Zee said. “It’s the Wampanoag word for ‘high places.’”
“My buddies and I carried our shovels into every cove and scrambled over every rock formation on the coast, and we always came up dry.”
“That doesn’t mean that pirates weren’t here,” Zee said.
“You’re right about that, too, laddie. Could be he sent some other buccaneers to bring it home, or that others got to the treasure before we did.”
“How about Gertie Thaw’s farm?” I asked.
I was forming a picture of her now: a bold girl in her new calico dress with scarlet silk ribbons, things Lemuel Kyd had given to her in exchange for a hiding place away from the ocean side of the island. Maybe he even let her have a piece or two of gold so she would keep his secrets.
Secrets from the Deep Page 4
