Sunken Treasure Lost Worlds

by Hep Aldridge

  I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, becoming aware of my surroundings once again, and realized I had blown past the Titusville exit, my usual turnaround point. I saw taillights off in the distance and, in the rearview mirror, a set of headlights some distance back. I looked at the speedometer and saw it sitting at 155 mph. I quickly calculated my next turnaround should be Hwy 46 and figured it was coming up quickly, but I had a couple of minutes, so I let her climb to 160 before slowly backing down. I got to the Rt.46 turn off at about 100 mph, got on the brakes, and flicked the wheel to the right and hit the off-ramp perfectly. Getting on the brakes hard, I pulled in the beast to 50 mph before getting to the stop sign, which I didn’t slow down for, but seeing no traffic in either direction, saw no reason for a complete stop. Sorry, Officer. I accelerated into a left turn four-wheel drift under the interstate and made an immediate left under power onto the southbound on-ramp, easily keeping the drift under control, shifting out of second and into third at about 110, once again merging onto I-95 south this time.

  By now, my adrenaline had reached a more normal level. My muscles had lost their tightness and was replaced by a wonderful fatigue. I slipped the transmission into fourth gear, slowed, and headed south at a sedate 80 miles per hour, more relaxed than I had been in weeks. There still wasn’t any traffic south bound, but I noticed the north-bound vehicle as it went by was an FHP Dodge Charger, now with its red and blue lights on. Oops, I thought and watched in my mirror as he blew past the Rt. 46 turnoff, still heading north. Phew, maybe he was headed to an accident or after someone else, not me… hmm, not likely, I thought, as I passed the Titusville turn off. I was thinking the luck I had been having lately was continuing when I saw the blue flashing lights in my rearview mirror. I immediately looked at my speedometer, sitting right on 80. Well, better than 160, I thought, as I turned on my right-hand turn signal, slowed, and headed for the shoulder.

  By the time the trooper was getting out of his car, I had my license, registration, and insurance card in hand. Being so low to the ground, I could only see the officer from the waist down as he approached with his flashlight.

  “Do you have any idea how fast you were going?” the trooper said.

  “Yes, I do,” I replied as I realized there was something familiar about the voice, “about 80,” I said.

  “Not just now,” he replied in his best trooper voice, “the first time, northbound, about 20 minutes ago?” There was a lengthy pause, and he continued, “You know, when I was in college, I always wanted a 240 Z but could never afford one.”

  I was startled for a moment as I finally recognized the voice and then said, “Trooper Connors?” leaning my head down so I could look up at the man standing by the door.

  He had turned off his flashlight and said, “Hello, Doc, mind stepping out of the car?” James Connors was a big guy at about 6’3” and right around 240 lbs. We had crossed paths a few times on some of my previous highway excursions. He’d given me a couple of warning citations, but the most recent contact with him was on a return trip from Gainesville when I saw a minivan go off the road in front of me and burst into flames. I pulled over and ran to the vehicle and began pulling people out. It was a family; the mother was the driver, and the father had been asleep in the passenger’s seat when a front tire blew and caused the accident. Trooper Connors was the first officer on the scene. I had just gotten the wife out and was working on the kids when he arrived, and we worked together to get the rest of them out before fire engulfed the vehicle. Mother, Father, and three kids, they were banged up, but all had been belted in, so they got lucky.

  We pulled them to safety minutes before the van turned into an inferno and Connors went out of his way to make sure the authorities knew he had helped me save their lives, not the other way around when he filed his report. He had proven himself to be an honorable man and a real hero as far as I was concerned, and I considered him a friend.

  Guess if I was going to get busted, it might as well be by one of the good guys, I thought. As I stepped out of the vehicle, I said in my most innocent voice, “Sir, I have no idea what you’re talking about.” There was a moment’s pause, and then he laughed and said, "You’re a lousy liar, Dr. Burnett," as he extended his hand. As I took it, I said “Colten, and I thought I did a pretty good job,” and laughed myself.

  "Well, you or someone has Simpson chasing his tail up around Mims, still headed north."

  “Is that so?” I said.

  "Yep, he was on the north-bound I-95 on-ramp at Port St. John, when some sports car blew by at over a hundred miles per hour."

  I looked at him with a straight face, and said, “You don’t say? A hundred miles an hour, wow."

  "I was on my way back from Daytona when I heard the call. The BOLO said a sports car was headed north at a high rate of speed. I figured I’d see it, but you know what? I saw nothing but an 18-wheeler between me and Simpson heading north… but I did happen to see a sports car heading south traveling slightly over the speed limit."

  I held up my hands and said, "Guilty, I admitted I was doing about 80, remember?"

  "Yeah, well, that’s not going to get you a ticket tonight. Besides, Simpson lost sight of the vehicle somewhere just north of Titusville, so he should have broken off pursuit by now. He just got one of those new Chargers with the police Hemi in it, and I think he wants to show off."

  I said, "Well, hypothetically speaking if the vehicle he was pursuing was doing over a hundred mph as he was coming onto 95, the laws of physics were against him from the beginning. I don’t care what kind of Hemi he had."

  Connors chuckled again and said, "Last I heard, he was running about 120-125.

  I shook my head, "Wouldn’t be enough."

  "Really?" Connors said.

  "Nope," I replied.

  "Well, hypothetically speaking, how fast would he have to have been going to catch this vehicle?"

  "Well, saying the vehicle in question was still accelerating when the pursuit began, and say it got up to 150 or 155, that would have happened long before Trooper Simpson hit 120; then it would have been almost impossible for him to catch it."

  Connors looked the 240 Z over from front to back slowly, I think with a new respect for the elegant lady, "Hmm, 150 I’ll have to remember that" he said, obviously rolling the data around in his head.

  "I don’t think you have any worries about that, though," I replied; "I’m sure whoever it was won’t be back this way anytime soon."

  Connors looked at me a little more sternly and said, “I hope not, Colten, at least not on my watch,” as he stuck out his hand and said, “be safe.”

  I took his hand and said, “I’ll do my best,” as he handed my license and registration back. As he was walking away, I said, "Actually, it was closer to 160."

  I saw him pause; he never turned around, but I heard him say, “Impressive,” as he kept walking. I got home and pulled into the garage and took one last look at my beauty with a smile on my face and as I gently slid the car cover back over her said, “Till next time…” and headed to bed.

  I slept for 12 hours and felt like a new man when I awoke the next day.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  We had been in Ecuador for the past three weeks, getting ourselves acclimated to the environment and altitude. Coming from sea level to around 8,400 feet altitude impacted our breathing as we learned our way around Cuenca, putting our feelers out for any information that might be floating around about the library and finding ourselves reliable transportation. We had rented an old Range Rover that had seen better days around 15 years ago, but it beat walking, barely. I had gotten rooms at the Condor Hotel, a moderately priced place outside of the tourist zone but close to the main roads leading out of the city to the mountainous countryside.

  The idea was to establish ourselves as “just” another group of American adventure/treasure hunters looking for the fabled Lost Golden Library. We soon found that we were just one of several groups tromping through the mountains
and caves of the Tayos region looking for the same thing. Not far from the hotel we found an excellent bar, restaurant, hang out called Diego’s Place. It was run by an American Ex-Pat from California who had volunteered as part of a privately funded library expedition in the mid ‘90s. They didn’t find much of anything. So, they soon ran out of money since their backers saw nothing in return for their investment and pulled their funding. Once the search was disbanded, he and a friend of his decided to hang out for a while in Cuenca. Of course, there was a woman involved; she had also been part of the expedition, a local who had a degree in archaeology and whose father taught at the local university. The Americans name was Douglas Robbins, and his lady friend/partner was Theresa Sanchez. Both were delightful and full of information, history and folklore they were willing to share. I refrain from using the term legend, or tall tales, using folklore instead since we came here knowing there was truth behind many of those stories.

  Theresa oversaw the food portion of the establishment while Doug took care of the bar end of things. Dimitri proclaimed it our HQ while in Ecuador, when Doug pulled a chilled bottle of his favorite Russian Vodka from behind the bar and started pouring shots. I had to agree; the environment was perfect, the walls were covered with photographs, newspaper, and magazine articles about the history of the local area and of searches for the Golden Library. The food was excellent, hospitality was genuine, and the bar… well, the bar was the bar and well stocked. We made it our main place for eating, drinking, and just hanging out talking and doing a lot of listening.

  According to Doug, most people looking for the library made at least one stop at Diego’s Place while in town. Others, like us, became regulars, put down squatter’s rights on certain tables within the spacious bar/dining room, and showed up on a regular basis. It wasn’t long till we blended in with the clientele and made new friends and connections. First stage of the mission accomplished!

  While we all spoke some Spanish, Joe, Doc, and O’Reilly were truly the best of the group. What was interesting was that not being a strong Spanish speaker didn’t turn out to be that problematic at Diego’s. English was spoken most widely, and on any given night, you might hear conversations in German, French, and Italian in addition to Spanish. We spent most of our days driving into the countryside and the thickly canopied mountains, getting a feel for what we would be up against when we started our search in earnest. While it was breathtakingly beautiful, and the main roads were paved and maintained, our short excursions onto the mountain roads showed them to be narrow, hard to traverse, and at times, extremely dangerous, with three-to four-hundred-foot drops at the edge of the one-lane rocky roads.

  We all developed a healthy sense of caution when driving. Blind corners, wash outs, and rock slides were not uncommon, although the locals seemed to take it in stride. When mud or rock slides made it necessary, they would dig into the mountainside just far enough to create a new narrow passage for the vehicles that plied these treacherous roads. We soon discovered our geriatric Range Rover to be woefully inadequate for our needs.

  After one such day we sat at Diego’s, bemoaning the limitations of our current transport when Doug, who had been talking with us from behind the bar, asked if we would be interested in purchasing a vehicle. When we asked for more information, he explained to us he still owned the vehicle they had used on the expedition he had been on and would be willing to let it go for a very reasonable price. Our interest piqued, we asked for more details; it was a four-wheel drive 1975 Suburban he affectionately called “The Beast.” He said he had it stored at a buddy’s auto shop and, if we were interested, we could go look at it the next morning.

  Dimitri piped up, “That’s 20 years older than our current rental vehicle that we were just complaining about.”

  Doug assured us the age didn’t matter; the vehicle was tough, it had rarely left them stranded, and covered some serious mountainous terrain in its time.

  With a certain amount of trepidation, we agreed to have a look the next day. He had gotten so excited when extolling the virtues and ruggedness of this thing we didn’t want to hurt his feelings and take the chance of ruining what was turning into a great friendship, so we agreed to meet him out front at ten the next morning and have a look at his “Beast.”

  We picked up Doug the next morning and after a short drive found ourselves in front of a two-story warehouse-looking building with two large roll- up bay doors on its front. It was located in what at one time had been an industrial business area. It was still busy, but the buildings had seen better days decades ago. We parked out front and went in the one open bay door and found ourselves in a large open bay with various cars and trucks littering the interior. Most had their hoods up or were jacked up, sitting on cinder blocks, and we saw several young men and boys with their heads stuck in the engine compartments or lying on their backs underneath, busy at various tasks on each one.

  As we walked through the beehive of activity toward the back of the building Doug shouted, “Hey, Sean, you in here?"

  To which a young man under the pickup truck we were standing next to replied, "Senor Sean is in the back." Doug thanked him, and we wound our way through a maze of vehicles in various states of repair/disrepair toward the rear of the building. There must have been 12 to 15 vehicles being worked on by as many men and boys and even a few young women. I would categorize it as organized chaos, but the work area was clean and well-lit with fluorescent light fixtures hanging from the 15-foot ceilings and the sounds of air wrenches, hammering and other power tools being used echoed around us.

  We neared the back of the cavernous room and were surprised to see two men in coveralls under the hood of a 1969 Dodge Super Bee, looking to be in pristine shape. It was parked next to a 69 Chevy Chevelle Super Sport, equally beautiful. There were four or five other cars lined up under car covers, hiding their identity, next to them. Doug said, "Sean,” in a loud voice and one of the two individuals came out from under the hood and responded with a huge grin.

  "Hey, Dougie, what brings you to my neck of the woods?" Doug was around six feet tall and the mechanic that greeted him was at least three inches taller, and had a bandana tied around a head full of curly blond hair. They approached each other and did the bear hug thing, slapping each other on the back as longtime friends would do.

  As we walked up, the mechanic acknowledged us and stuck out his hand, saying, “Sean Jamison,” as Doug introduced us. We immediately began admiring the Dodge and commented on its fantastic condition compared to most older vehicles we had seen on the roads.

  Joe had walked up to the front of the car and, as he looked under the hood said, “383 Magnum, very nice.”

  Sean was beaming; he was proud of this vehicle, “Yep, all original, matching numbers, four-speed with a posi-rear end."

  "Sweet ride," Dimitri chimed in as he checked out the perfect interior.

  "Yeah, I’ve made sure she was taken care of since the day I bought her."

  After we talked cars for a bit and found out he had a few more classics under the covers, either restored or on their way to restoration, Sean asked, "So, what’s up, Dougie?"

  Doug grinned at the use of his personal nickname and said, “These guys might be interested in buying the Beast.”

  “No shit,” Sean replied.

  “No shit,” Doug said.

  “Well, hell, let’s take a look at it I haven’t seen it in a couple of years myself,” as he turned and headed to the far end of the row of covered cars. As we got to the last vehicle, we saw it had a tarp over it, not a real car cover, and had been used as a repository for all kinds of loose parts sitting on the hood, tires and wheels on the roof, axels and radiators leaning against its sides. It took us ten minutes to remove all the junk just so we could pull the tarp off.

  What we saw was indeed a 1975 Suburban that had seen better days. Three of the four tires were flat, and it was covered in dirt and mud that must have been on it when it was parked, no telling how long ago. The int
erior wasn’t in bad shape but could use some work. It had a light bar across the roof with a couple of busted driving lights hanging from it, and the homemade front bumper had obviously done its job and Come in contact with some large semi-immovable objects. The body was in surprisingly good shape, no major dings or dents.

  “What’s it got for a motor?” I asked.

  Sean popped the hood and said, “A small block Chevy we got from a donor car back in the day, but it’s got over a hundred thousand miles on it and was on its last leg when I brought it in here and parked it.”

  I looked at him and said, “That’s not much of a sales pitch.”

  He smiled and said, “If you really want to buy this thing, I want you to know what you’re getting for your money. When it comes to automotive stuff, I’m as honest as they come. I’ve been screwed a few times and learned my lessons the hard way. I do believe in karma, and I want to keep mine in good shape as long as I can.”

  Dimitri and Joe had been crawling over, under and around the Beast the whole time Sean and I were talking. I waited until they finished and walked over to us, I knew I would get a full report from them.

  “Well?” I asked.

  Joe spoke up first, “Frame looks in good shape, the front transfer case seal is leaking, floor panels are good, but suspension looks shot.”

  Dimitri followed, “Body is in good shape, interior doesn’t look bad, but I wouldn’t want to ride on any of these roads in it; lights and wiring seem a little worse for wear but nothing that can’t be fixed.” Joe nodded in agreement.