Butler Did It! (6 page)

A huge man, dressed in dark trousers
and a heavy pea jacket and greasy officer’s cap, dominated the
afterdeck. He was easily six foot six inches tall and although he
probably weighed over three hundred pounds, none of it was fat. His
face was ruddy and featured a nose that had been broken more than
once. A ragged scar ran up his left cheek and under a black eye
patch. His remaining eye was steely gray and bloodshot.

As he moved closer, Kobi could see that
the man had a concealed pistol under his pea jacket. A well used
large blackjack stuck out of the man’s pocket.

“We caught a stowaway, Captain, and we
were just having a bit of fun.”

“So, I see,” said Larsen, looking at
the results of the savage beating lying at his feet. “Bring him up
on deck; I want to get a good look at him.”

“This kaffir must have snuck aboard at
Mombasa. Cookie caught him stealing food from the galley,”
explained Gunner, as they dragged the limp Kobi up the
stairs.

“What do you want us to do with him,
Captain?” Feral gleams suddenly developed in the eyes of the
assembled crew. All were anticipating one of Captain Larsen’s
infamous and highly original tortures designed to reduce humanity
to a single agonized nerve ending.

“So, one man, with nothing but a pair
of filthy shorts, sneaks onto my ship and no one notices him for
six days? That really says a lot for the security aboard this
ship.”

It slowly dawned on the crew that the
stowaway’s punishment was not the first thing on the Captain’s
agenda. Increasing fear broke across the craggy faces of the
assembled men.

“We must not have enough discipline
aboard.” The Captain decided.

Things had suddenly changed. From the
tone of the Captain’s speech, the focus was no longer on Kobi.
While the attention was off him, he took a quick look around and
was relieved to see a small island within swimming distance. Hope
swelled within and he mustered all the strength remaining in his
body.

“Until further notice, every man aboard
will stand watch on watch.” A quiet groan ran through the crew.
Watch on watch for such a small crew meant 20 hours on duty and
only 4 hours rest.

Only the hulking Gunner had the nerve
to ask, “But, Captain, what about the stowaway?”

The Captain gave the black man a look
that one might give to a bit of gum stuck to a shoe. Kobi knew in
his soul that there would be no mercy from this man.

“Loan him a couple lengths of chain and
pitch him overboard.”

Kobi’s reaction to such a casual
announcement of his death sentence caused an involuntary cringe, a
reaction that the captain immediately noticed.

“Belay that! Stand him up.”

Knowing that he had few options, Kobi
cooperated as two burly crewmen hoisted him upright.

“So, you’re just a bloody kaffir who
wants to run away to sea?” Then with a sudden squint of suspicion.
“Do you speak English? No! How about French? Parley Vu,
Frenchie?”

Kobi kept his battered face as
impassive as possible, knowing that the remaining seconds of his
life depended upon it.

“No? Then you must just be a stupid
plonker who can’t understand a word I’m saying.”

With a rapid change of mood, Larsen
barked out orders. “Turn him around. Lemme see his hands.” A brief
inspection confirmed some brutish suspicion. “I thought so. These
aren’t the hands of a laborer! Hell, his nails have even been
trimmed recently.”

“Boys, I think we’ve got us a police
spy.” Larsen pronounced in tones usually reserved for Magistrates
chortling during sentencing. “Why, I’d wager he even understands
English.”

“So, what do you want to do with him?”
Gunner asked, grinning evilly, in anticipation of future
fun.

Captain Larsen gripped Kobi’s jaw in
one massive hand, squeezing cruelly.

“Weasel, go get my cricket bat. I feel
the need for a bit of exercise.”

“Aw, Captain, it’s not fair, you always
have all the fun.” One voice whined peevishly.

“One more sound out of you, Ned Coop
and I’ll be beating on two.” Larsen threatened, his eyes never
leaving Kobi’s face.

Despite his dire predicament, Kobi
couldn’t suppress the revulsion. His body betrayed him, and he
shuddered violently. At that second, both Larson and he knew that
the masquerade was up.

With an explosive burst of energy, Kobi
kicked Larson squarely in the groin; head butted the crewman to the
left and spun out of the grip of the crewman to his right. In an
ungainly lurching run, hampered by his bound wrists, he dove off
the back of the dark yacht and into the cool welcoming embrace of
the sea.

<<>>

LITTLE CURIEUSE ISLE,
SEYCHELLES

Scientists call it ‘Latimeria
Chalumnae.’ The Comoros Islanders call it ‘Gombessa, the beast.’
The South Africans call it ‘Ol’ Four Legs.’ The French call it,
‘Poisson Repugnant.’ However, the Seychellois, the Creole natives
of the Seychelles, have come up with the best name yet, ‘Oogly
Fish.’ Scientifically it is known as the Coelacanth, the four
hundred million year-old fish that was thought to have become
extinct sixty five million years ago, only to be rediscovered in
1938 off the coast of Madagascar. The fish’s ancestors, the first
Coelacanths, had filled a niche as a basal reef predator with over
thirty species, not long after the Indian land mass started a mad
dash for Asia. From the beginning, the instinctual journey north
from Madagascar to the granitic Seychelles was a once in a lifetime
event for the species.

The fish in question, a pregnant
female, nearly six feet in length, and weighing close to one
hundred fifty pounds, was deep blue in color with silver highlights
along her dorsal scales. Ancient urges drew her back to the very
sea caves where she had been born nearly forty years before.
Instinctively, she knew that soon she would live-birth twenty
Coelacanth pups. The thousand-mile migration had exhausted her,
but, with effort, she had arrived at the sea caves in the reef wall
surrounding Little Curieuse Isle. All she had to do was defend her
cave from other predators.

<<>>

With a quick and nearly silent gurgle
of bubbles, the beautiful woman in a red neoprene skin-suit checked
her diving gear one last time and then slipped into the clear blue
water off Little Curieuse Isle.

At low tide, the isle was a one half
kilometer cluster of palms and mangroves with a wide, shallow sand
beach on the southern side, and a reef and lagoon complex on the
north side. At high tide, however, the only thing above water was
the circle of trees, which was a convenient resting place for
migrating sea birds. Although numerous birds used the refuge daily,
there was insufficient shelter during storms to warrant any nesting
pairs wanting to make a home on Little Curieuse. Most of the Fairy
Terns, Noddies, and other birds that migrated through every year
passed by the islet and nested on Praslin Island to the
south.

Of course, from the viewpoint of
tourism, the wealth of attractions on the bigger islands in the
Seychelles Group put Little Curieuse far down on the list of
popular places to visit, which made it very appealing to one
particular person.

Katherine Annenberg, a commercial
photographer out of Durban, South Africa, was searching for that
one great photograph that would pay for her trip. She had come to
the Seychelles to attend SUBIOS, the Seychelles annual underwater
photography competition. She had a couple of images entered in the
competition and had hopes of winning an award. Still, she mused,
awards don’t pay hotel bills.

As a moderately skilled diver, she knew
she was breaking a cardinal rule by diving alone. She was running
what was euphemistically known as an economic risk. Everything in
the Seychelles was expensive, but the highest costs were
accommodations, dive boats and especially dive boat guides. After
she had spent nearly 14,000 Rand for a new waterproof housing for
her camera, her budget could only afford two of those three
expenses. The guide who normally would have doubled as her dive
buddy had been sacrificed accordingly.

Katherine swam across the top of the
granite reef heading toward the reef wall to the north. In this
lonely location, she hoped to find the one great photograph that
would break her out of the commercial photography rut and get her
some recognition as an art photographer. While she explored, she
thought about the SUBIOS competition.

If I win, it will launch my
future as an artistic photographer. Of course, if I don’t win
anything at the competition, I may be able to recoup some of my
expenses by turning the photograph into a poster, and perhaps
selling it to the South African Board of Tourism.

As she skimmed over and around odd bits
of granite reef that poked up from the bottom, avoiding the patches
of soft corals, sea anemones, and sponges, she stopped often and
investigated all the fissures, cracks, and the occasional sea cave
looking for that perfect picture, the one she could see in her
mind’s eye.
It has to be something unique, maybe even something
so radically different that it will make everyone sit up and take
notice, s
he thought.

As she got closer to the reef wall, the
current washing in from the open ocean became suddenly cooler,
chilling her, not only physically but mentally as well.

Warm water always seems
inviting
, she whispered to herself,
while cold water always
has that chill of danger attached.

She clicked her tongue in disgust,
pushing away the negative thoughts.

I’m glad I took the time to
put on a wet suit over my new bikini. It is too bad that I chose
this thin latex skin suit instead of the thicker neoprene. This
water is colder than I expected. Well, at least, I have some
protection against scrapes and bruises.

The first time she wore the bikini, she
hadn’t failed to notice that she had turned the heads of every male
on the beach.
Of course, today, what does it matter? I could be
swimming naked if I wanted. The nearest human being is on Praslin
Island, over twenty kilometers away.

In truth, the nearest human beings were
less than a kilometer away from her and rapidly
approaching.

As Katherine swam along the face of the
reef wall, variable currents made her progress treacherous and
tiring. She knew if she wasn’t careful, a sudden change in current
flow could easily push her back into a nearby branch coral thicket
that would leave her cut and bleeding in no time. However, she put
extra effort in every stroke until she was able to drop further
down the face into quieter water. At a depth of seven meters, the
current flow turned into a general upwelling from below that made
her adjust her buoyancy to accommodate its effect. She drifted
laterally along the reef wall using her dive light to illuminate
the holes and sea caves in the reef. Most were shallow with a
variety of creatures living a tentacle-to-mouth
existence.

She drifted down near the bottom of the
reef wall, finding a ledge, which jutted out away from the wall.
Beneath it, a large cavern opened before her. Its tipped-down mouth
encrusted with fan coral and a colony of sea urchins that bristled
up at her approach. Only when she dropped below the ledge to peer
up inside the entrance with the dive light, did she discover that a
small beam of daylight could be seen streaming down from the roof
at the back of the cavern.

This is interesting
, she
thought,
it is quite rare for a sea cave this deep to extend all
the way back to the surface.

The cavern entrance was easily over
seven meters across and two meters high and extended at least
twenty-five meters back into the reef. From what she could see, the
interior arched up to nearly three meters above the surface of the
water before constricting back into a narrow chimney. This rose in
a series of ledges to the open top.

Despite being nine meters below the
surface, the entrance had a perceptible current flow. While she was
still deciding to enter the cavern, the current slowly pulled her
inside.

At first, she was startled and fought
the current. However, discovering that she had sufficient power to
defeat it, she decided instead to explore.

Her mind raced as she tried to
understand the simple physics in operation in this strange realm.
The entrance to the cavern was surprisingly free of sea
growth,

The current must be strong
enough to prevent sea growth from choking off the chamber. I’ll bet
it really flows in here at the peak of high tide.

As she moved closer to the sunlight,
she quickly discovered that an abundance of sea life clung to the
walls and floor. Hundreds of clams with razor sharp shells
decorated the walls. A well-cropped kelp garden grew in the sunny
patch and several brittle starfish and crabs fought territorial
skirmishes over the shaded portion around it.

It took her a minute or two to
understand.

It’s a flooded blowhole!
She
marveled.

Floating in the patch of sunlight, she
made a slow 360-degree circle of the chamber. For the most part,
the recesses of the chamber were barren, all except one. Katherine
caught a flash of blue as the glass of her mask reflected some of
the sunlight into one of the darker recesses. Suddenly fearful, she
aimed her dive light into a three-meter deep fracture. A hideous
toothy face stared back at her. Her heart raced as she immediately
thought that the creature was a shark. Yet, it didn’t look like a
shark and it certainly wasn’t showing any signs of aggression. She
slowly moved to the left and again shined her dive light on the
creature. To her immediate relief she saw that it was a large,
mottled, chocolate brown fish with irregular scales that had a blue
iridescence. Its large copper-colored eyes reflected back her
light, giving them an eerie glow.