Circle of Bones - Kling Christine - Страница 101

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She scooted over closer to him until their arms touched. She felt something dig into her hip, and she remembered the bag of chestnuts she’d stuffed in her pocket earlier. She readjusted her rain jacket, then rested her head against his shoulder. “I owe you an apology. I ran out on you in Guadeloupe. I wouldn’t blame you if you’re mad at me. I should have stuck around longer.”

She had neglected him in the weeks following the eruption and earthquake. She’d neglected everyone, living and dead, including herself. Dozens had died on Montserrat, and though the casualty list was not great on Guadeloupe, the damage from the earthquake there had been significant. They’d had to shut down the power plants, and the whole island had been under a boil water order for over a week.

Theo slid his arm around her shoulders. “Those were tough days for all of us. I heard you went back to your boat and sailed down to Martinique.”

After several days of answering questions and watching from St. Francois as the French authorities sent boats and divers out to the site, she’d returned to her boat at Marie Gallant, pulled up her anchor and left, without even a good bye to Theo.

“Yeah. I had to get away. I sailed south until I found this little bay. It was called Case-Pilote. Nobody knew me there, and I wanted to stay on the boat and wallow in my misery.”

Theo rested his hand on her shoulder. “I’m sorry I wasn’t able to help you.”

“I’m sure you had your hands full.”

“You’re right there.”

 “I stayed in my bunk at first. For days. Didn’t even go to my father’s funeral. But after several weeks of twisting in my sheets, one of the local fishermen knocked on my hull. I tried to ignore him, but he wouldn’t go away. When I finally went topsides, he said the people in the village were worried about me. They wanted to know if I was okay.”

She had wanted to tell the man no, that she never would be okay, that the ash was still clogging her eyes and ears and mouth and lungs.

“Island people are like that,” Theo said.

Riley nodded. “He gave me a gift of some fresh grouper,” she said. “And I was surprised to discover I was hungry.” She remembered grilling the fish on the little barbecue on her stern rail that night. She ate the entire filet and for the first time in days, she threw no food overboard. Soon after, she contacted her employers at Mercury, and they offered her work on a project in Fort de France.

Theo smiled. “I understood why you left. But I still should have checked up on you.”

Riley half-turned to face him. “Tell me about you. What happened to you afterwards?”

“I managed all right. It took a while, though. At first, the French government made a stab at seizing Shadow Chaser, but I turned to my uncle for help. Cole had set me up as a partner of Full Fathom Five Maritime Exploration, and eventually, I was able to get away with the boat. I took her home to Dominica. I was based out of Portsmouth doing some local salvage work for most of the summer hurricane season. Went down and visited Henri Michaut several times. And I built the Enigma II. It’s a new design for deep water work.”

“And how is Henri?”

Theo smiled. “He’s doing much better now.”

“So where’s Shadow Chaser?”

“Hauled out down in Puerto La Cruz, Venezuela. We’re doing quite a bit of work on her –repairs, new paint, new electronics. You know.”

She wondered where he was getting the money for all these repairs, but it wasn’t any of her business anymore. “You’ve really grown up these past months, Theo. You were a boy when I first met you and now, look at you. You’re the captain of Shadow Chaser and head of Full Fathom Five.”

Theo didn’t say anything for over a minute. She felt him stiffen as he watched a tall, slender man in a green jogging outfit who strolled past them. The man wore sunglasses on this cloudy day and black wires snaked from his ears down inside the collar of his jacket. When the man saw them watching, he began to sing and rock his head back and forth.

Theo patted her hand after the man had passed. They sat there next to the Surcouf memorial, both of them staring off to the southwest, lost in their thoughts.

“God, I miss him,” she said.

Theo nodded, his lips pressed together in a half smile.

She sighed. “Cole Thatcher and his crazy theories. He sure had a way of getting to you, didn’t he?”

Theo nodded.

“I mean, sometimes, I swear I’m suspicious of everything now. I get the feeling I’m being followed, but then the person I suspected of following me just passes on by. I never have proof, but the feeling won’t go away.”

Theo turned his head to look at the man in the green jogging suit. “I know what you mean.”

She took a deep breath and slapped her hands down on her thighs. “So, what does the future hold for Theo? What are your plans?”

“For one thing, I’ve been invited to your new president’s inauguration.”

“Theo! You’re kidding! How marvelous for you. Are you going with your uncle? Part of some official delegation from Dominica?”

“Something like that. We worked a little magic.”

“I guess. Those invitations aren’t easy to come by.”

Theo smiled at her but said nothing.

“I wish Cole had lived to see this,” she said. “Maybe the world isn’t as bleak a place as Cole thought. Maybe the Patriarchs,” Riley paused, then took a deep breath. “And my dad — weren’t as bad as they seemed. Maybe it was just one crazy, evil man, Diggory Priest who was responsible for all the killing.”

She wanted to believe that.

Theo removed his arm from her shoulder and folded his hands in his lap. She looked at him and saw him suck his lips in over his teeth. Then he looked up at the sky and said, “Yeah.”

“But Cole was so sure that the Patriarchs were going to take over the country and steal the election if he didn’t get his hands on Operation Magic – and then look what happened. Maybe it was Priest’s death. Maybe it was my father’s. Or maybe, those Bonesmen weren’t as powerful as Cole’s theories made them out to be. In the end, there were no Swift Boat politics, no hanging chads or dirty rumors that swayed the country, and the people’s candidate won. God, I’d love to see Cole’s face now.”

Theo chuckled. Then he reached down and lifted his backpack. Setting it on his knees, he unzipped the top. He removed a tattered brown padded envelope. “Cole told me to give this to you.”

He placed the envelope in her hands. She bit her lip. She wasn’t going to cry.

“What’s in it?” she asked.

“Just a couple of things he’d want you to have.”

 Theo stood and walked to the front of the monument. His eyes followed the list of names down the stones, then he looked away. “I have some research to do in the Maritime Museum here, so I’d better go. Investors want a constant feed of news, you know. We’ve got a new fellow from down in Venezuela pouring money our way. He’s all hot about searching for another wreck, in the Pacific somewhere off Thailand, so when we get out of the yard, it’ll be business as usual for Shadow Chaser.” He bent down and kissed her on the cheek. “You take care, Riley. Be careful.”

He turned then and strode off back down the jetty.

Her first impulse was to follow him. Why was he leaving so soon? What did he mean, be careful? She wanted to talk, take him out to dinner, hear more about what had happened after she left Guadeloupe.

She looked down at the envelope in her lap. The flap was not sealed. She lifted the folded edge and peered inside.

Riley recognized the book at once. It was the last volume of James Thatcher’s journals, the one that ended with the poem. She went to pull it out of the bag, but it was tangled up with some sort of white cord. She yanked harder and the book slid out along with a small metal square. It was one of those clip-on aluminum iPods. Attached to it, was a set of ear buds.

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