Poseidon's Daughter

by Diane A. S. Stuckart

  Halia, half-dressed and pliant in his arms that night in the courtyard, evoking in him an unfamiliar swell of emotion that had seemed to spring from something more than physical need.

  And she was what this entire adventure of his was all about, he suddenly realized. Not a lost city--not some long-hidden treasure--just her. And it had been that way from the first moment they'd met, though he had tried his damnedest to deny it.

  The revelation stopped him in his tracks.

  “Bloody hell,” he groaned out, desperately waiting for his inner voice to speak up again and argue the point. For surely he hadn't escaped the clutches of any number of marriage-minded young women over the years, just to succumb to the doubtful charms of the only woman who had turned him down flat when he tried to seduce her.

  He stood there a few minutes beneath the hot sun, vaguely aware that his collar was wilting in the heat and his sweat-soaked shirt beneath his waistcoat was rapidly plastering itself to his back. Finally, when no mental arguments were forthcoming, in a swift gesture of frustration he whipped off his bowler and dashed it to the sandy ground.

  Bloody, bloody hell! He had succumbed, no doubt about it, though for the life of him he couldn't imagine why. He had made it his business over the years to remain free of emotional entanglements, most especially those involving attractive young women. And he'd always succeeded in that goal—that was, apparently, until now.

  The sound of childish giggling from behind a low wall recalled him to his senses. He glanced over at the cottage beside him to see half a dozen shiny little black faces peeping over the rocky ledge at him. Sheepishly, he bent to retrieve his battered hat, when something in the dirt-packed yard caught his eye...a strutting red rooster with tail feathers like a New Orleans showgirl's plumes.

  Slowly, he brushed off his bowler and put it back on, his gaze never leaving the gaudy fowl. Rooster feathers. He'd seen bundles of them and other more esoteric items in Lally's possession the day they'd left Savannah. And then, a few days later, the Haitian woman had prepared an ointment just for him—ostensibly to relieve his sunburn.

  But what if she'd had an ulterior motive in offering her services? What if that healing ointment had contained something else...such as a voodoo love potion?

  It was an insane notion, Malcolm firmly told himself and continued down the sandy lane. If anything, any spell of Lally's would likely be designed to push him and Halia apart, not bring them together as lovers.

  Still, the superstitious corner of his mind that subscribed to lucky emeralds and watch fobs-as-talismans was not placated. After all, he could argue it the other way—that Lally might want him to fall in love with Halia so that he would not be tempted to steal her blind, as was his intent. And how else to explain his uncharacteristic behavior, save that some external force was in control of his emotions?

  Mentally, he assembled the evidence at hand. First, he hadn't been looking to fall in love and, indeed, the possibility of such a happenstance had never even crossed his mind. Moreover, he'd always made it a rule never to become emotionally involved with any female connected with his work, a rule that he had never once broken. But the greatest inconsistency lay in the fact that he hadn't even bedded the chit yet...surely an important precursor to falling in love.

  That settled it. He had been hexed.

  Not certain whether to be relieved or outraged at this revelation, he settled on a plan of action. As soon as he reached the guest house, he would track down Lally and demand that she affect some sort of cure for this malady of the heart. And it would go badly with her, he vowed, if she refused.

  But by the time he reached the guest house, he realized that the sharp sword of his earlier resolve had been blunted. Perhaps the cause was the hot blanket of humid air that the tropical sun had laid across the town. Or maybe Lally's spell had an even tighter grip upon him than he feared, and he was succumbing to an unwilling sense of compassion. For, try as he might, he could not forget Halia's look of carefully checked anguish when she had learned the likely truth about her father.

  “All right, I'll have a bloody talk with Halia, first,” he muttered, as much to the absent Esta as to himself. With any luck, the chit would rebuff his overtures and, as was her habit, make him angry enough to dispel any more tender emotion. Then, he'd visit Lally.

  He made his way into the dimness of the main hall. The French doors along the far wall were open, allowing a cross-breeze that was a welcome respite from the early afternoon sun.

  A glance out onto the courtyard and an equally quick search of the lower floor yielded no sign of Halia. Likely, she had sought the sanctuary of her room, he told himself and started up the stairs. Once outside her chamber, he paused a moment to debate the wisdom of what he was about to do. Then, reluctantly, he knocked.

  Her unlocked door skittered open a few inches beneath his touch, but no Halia appeared. Curious, he pushed the door open a few inches wider and peered inside. The room was empty.

  Had she not come home...or had she returned and then already gone back out again?

  Unwilling concern supplanted curiosity, and he strode inside the chamber that was a smaller version of his own. He promptly noticed atop her bed a jumble of clothes he recognized as the skirt and shirtwaist she earlier had worn. As to what, if anything else, was missing or left behind, he could not guess.

  “Miss Halia, she be gone.”

  Nearly jumping out of his skin, Malcolm turned to meet Lally's censuring gaze. Then, swiftly assuming the casual air of one who'd been caught, uninvited, any number of times in someone else's room, he shrugged.

  “Gone?” he politely echoed. “Do you mean that she's stepped out for a breath of fresh air, or are you trying to tell me that she has fled the island entirely?”

  He promptly regretted his attempt at levity, for the Haitian woman's obsidian eyes narrowed into catlike slits, and she muttered an unintelligible imprecation. Bloody hell, she's trying another one of her hexes, was his first panicked thought.

  Then, mentally reproaching himself for letting himself be intimidated by a woman—never mind that she might possess uncanny powers—he assumed his best Sir John air and flashed her a stern look.

  “I asked you a civil question, madam,” he clipped out, “and I trust you will do me the courtesy of a civil answer, preferably in a tongue that I can understand.”

  A look of sly humor flashed across her dark features.

  “What I be sayin', Englishman, is dat she be gettin' the better of you again. Here you be, wanderin' about like a lost dog, an’ she be out lookin' for her treasure. An’ my spirits, they be tellin' me dat today, she be findin' out there what she be wantin' the most.”

  “You mean, she's out at the site? But Rolle and his crew aren't working today, so how—”

  He broke in mid-question and slapped a hand to his forehead. “Bloody hell, she took the skiff, didn't she!”

  At Lally's cool nod, he spun back around and stalked over to the open French doors, making his way out onto the gallery. Squinting past the bluff in the direction of the Atlantis site, he made out against the sparkling blue and green water a tiny blur of white that had to be the sail of her boat.

  He tightened his jaw against the stream of invectives that threatened. He'd be damned if he would let Lally think her mistress had bested him. Still, the woman's last comment indicated she thought Halia was onto something. Had the chit perhaps found some new clue in her father's journal and not bothered to share the knowledge?

  With an effort, he kept his tone light as he stepped back inside and addressed Lally again. “I believe you said something about your spirits claiming that Halia was going to find some sort of treasure today. I don't suppose they bothered to tell you exactly what it will be?”

  “Ignorant Englishman,” she spat back. “The spirits, they not be tellin' everyt'ing...not like some people dat can't never be keepin' their mouth shut.”

  He raised a wry brow and ignored that last insult.

  “What
a shame. I would have hoped your spirits would have been a bit more forthcoming. But then, vagueness is the hallmark of any good fortune-teller, is it not?”

  With that pleasant barb, he started for the door, only to halt in mid-step as he caught sight of something he'd not noticed before. A tiny framed photograph lay on the bed alongside the bundle of her clothing. Curious, he paused to pick it up.

  He immediately recognized Halia's aristocratic features rendered in sepia. As for the older man beside her—

  Frowning, he studied that other image a moment longer, and then slowly shook his head. He could be mistaken, he told himself. After all, it had been dark that night.

  No, not wrong, insisted the instincts that had served him so well these many years.

  His fingers tightened on the picture frame; then, with deliberate casualness, he held it out toward Lally. “This photograph of Halia...who is the man with her?”

  ”Dat be Mr. Arvin, her father,” she replied, regarding him with suspicion though it was apparent she could not see any harm in passing on that bit of wisdom.

  “Her father,” he softly repeated and allowed himself a small smile of triumph. Bloody hell, this shed a whole new light on things. His tone still one of unconcern, he asked, “So how long ago was it that he was lost at sea...two months, three months?”

  “Maybe,” was Lally's cryptic reply.

  It was enough, though. He tossed the picture back onto the bed. Giving wide berth to Lally, who continued to eye him like the local fishmonger examining a week-old catch, he headed out the door and down the corridor. No matter that he'd not taken time to question the woman about her voodoo activities, in general—and about love spells, in particular. He had other concerns now.

  Indeed, what held his thoughts was the photograph of Halia and her father. Whether all of his suspicions would prove correct, he could not guess, not until after he talked with Halia.

  And talk with her, he intended to do this very day... even if it meant waiting all afternoon on the dock for her to return.

  ~ Chapter 17 ~

  Malcolm had been waiting all afternoon on the dock for Halia to return.

  More accurately, he had spent the past several hours watching in turn from the dock, which jutted into the shallow harbor on the island's east side, and from the bluff with its view of the reefs off the western coast. It had been from that latter vantage point that he had thought he'd glimpsed Halia's sail several hours earlier. But whether it had been her or merely a distant flock of gulls atop the waves, he could not say with certainty.

  All he did know was that dusk was fast approaching, and she had not yet returned.

  “Bloody hell,” he muttered for the dozenth time now as he gazed over the bluff from his uncomfortable perch atop a flat rock. He had wasted a good half a day; still, given what he now knew, he wasn't about to let either of them continue their search until he'd had a chance to speak his piece to her.

  And what he had to say to Halia, she was not going to like...of that, he was certain.

  He shook his head. At least, his enforced wait had given him plenty of opportunity to think over his theory and reassure himself he was correct. He'd had his suspicions from the very start, to be sure. It was the photograph in Halia's bedchamber, however, that had clinched it. He knew without a doubt now that this entire Atlantis expedition truly was a hoax.

  For what else could it be, when it had been Halia's own father that night in Philadelphia who had sold Malcolm the missing coordinates?

  Sourly, he plucked out his already-soaked handkerchief and swiped at his forehead. At least, he'd had the sense to snatch up his boater on the way out, so that he'd had some protection from the blazing sun. Another saving grace was the fact that a few more clouds had scuttled in. That, combined with the setting sun, had dropped the temperature by a few degrees from intolerable to just barely endurable.

  Restless, he rose and stretched his cramped frame, squinting against the orange sun as it made its way toward the waiting blue waves. Maybe it would be cooler down by the water, he told himself. Besides which, maybe he'd find himself on the good side of Lally's spirits, and a marble figure of Poseidon would wash up on the beach and into his waiting hands.

  A few moments later, he had made his way down the bluff to the water's edge. The waves were eagerly lapping at the narrow strip of beach, spilling one after the other across the white sand as the tide began its inexorable climb toward the rocks. A welcome breeze had risen, as well, combining with the almost hypnotic sight and sound of the surf to make him relax...just a little.

  Frowning, he once more scanned the water in the direction from which she'd likely come. By now, the sun had dropped to the horizon and was slowly extinguishing itself in the deep blue waves. A few free-wheeling gulls still lingered atop the sea foam, while an occasional splash made by some enthusiastic fish broke the monotony.

  But of Halia, there was no sign.

  His frown deepened as he debated whether to give way to frustration or concern. For all he knew, the chit might have made her way to another landing point without his seeing her. Worse, maybe she'd taken an entirely different route to begin with, perhaps had gone to South Bimini, instead. He was debating whether or not to give it all up and head back for the house, when a shadowed movement in the shallow waters but a few yards from him caught his attention.

  Shark! was his first instinctive thought. Then, upon a second look, he realized that the silhouette was wrong. What had appeared to be a shadow was actually a diamond-shaped black creature that was as flat and wide across as a carriage wheel. Two hornlike protuberances adorned what he presumed to be its head, while a long tail trailed from its opposite end. It skimmed the reef with a flapping motion of either wing-like edge, as if it were flying beneath the waves.

  “A devil fish,” he determined aloud, mentally matching its description to that of several unusual varieties of fish he knew were more properly known as manta rays.

  Early into the expedition, one of his divers had made mention of those fish. Relatively harmless creatures, the man had assured him—save for certain smaller of the species. When threatened, they could deliver with their whip-like tails a painful sting capable of causing temporary paralysis, or even death. Still, their human victims were few and usually were unwitting swimmers who, wading in the shallows, accidentally stepped atop one of the ugly beasts.

  Intrigued by this fish that looked like something out of a nightmare, Malcolm forgot about Halia as he simply watched the manta making lazy circles along the shoreline.

  It moved with an economy of effort, barely rippling the water as it propelled itself in silence through the darkening waters. Back and forth it swam, hugging the white sand for a time. Then, changing course, it would rise to skim the sea's surface, gliding close enough so that he could make out the faint pattern of circles against its brownish-black hide.

  And then it was joined by a second manta.

  The pair glided in the shadowy shallows in a tropical ballet, first circling about as mirror images of each other, then each breaking free to swim in an independent pattern. They were grotesque and yet beautiful, repellent but utterly fascinating. He could have watched them forever, he realized, save that daylight was almost a memory now—and something from the corner of his vision now had caught his attention.

  He tore his gaze from the mantas and squinted at the dark shape bobbing atop the cobalt waves. It was moving closer, drawn toward shore by the inexorable tide. Finally, he made out a mast with a furled sail and realized what he saw was no ocean flotsam, but a boat.

  Halia's boat!

  For surely it was the very same craft that had brought him to the island that first day. He frowned and moved to the water's edge for a better look. Why would the boat be adrift, he wondered, rather than be moving under sail? And was he imagining things, or did the tiny craft appear to be empty?

  A chill feeling of dread settled in his gut. No, not necessarily empty, he told himself. It could be that she
had been taken ill and was lying in the bottom of the boat. Maybe she'd been injured, perhaps badly enough so that she had been unable to raise the sail again and been forced to drift her way back to shore. Or maybe—

  The mantas forgotten, he pulled off his boots and waded knee-deep into the water until he was several yards from shore.

  “Halia!” he called, his voice sounding abnormally loud over the gentle rush of the surf. “Damn it, Halia, what's wrong? Halia?”

  He cupped his hand behind his ear, straining to hear something—anything!—from the silent craft. Closer it came to shore, so that in another minute he finally could see within. And then the cold sensation in his belly spread like winter's ice to his heart.

  Empty.

  “Empty,” he murmured in disbelief. “Bloody hell, it's empty.”

  With a strangled, guttural sound, he grasped the edge of its hull and began to drag the drifting craft behind him toward shore. A moment later, gasping, he had dragged it as far onto the beach as he could, so that the tide would not reclaim it. Then, dreading what he might find, Malcolm clambered into the grounded boat to look for clues.

  The first thing he noted in the dying light was that the craft appeared normal. Halia's familiar black carpetbag was tightly lashed to the side, the sail neatly furled. Her neat little black boots sat primly on one bench, as if she had taken them off to swim. No crimson splashes of blood stained the skiffs pale boards, no gashes in the hull hinted at some mysterious violence. Everything was in order...

  Or was it?

  By now, his initial, uncharacteristic reaction of shock had given way to his usual chill logic. If the craft had simply been set adrift, then the anchor and its line should be coiled up at the ready. Yet there was no sign of the anchor, only a line dangling over the hull.

  He swiftly caught that rope and hauled it from the water, only to be brought up literally short. A portion of the anchor line remained—that was all, with the anchor presumably at the bottom of the Caribbean.