LC 04 - Skeleton Crew (6 page)

"We are conducting an archaeological survey in Georgia
waters," Trey said. "My divers will go where the artifacts lead
them. I'm assuming you're looking for the recreation of it and
don't intend to loot any of Georgia's historical resources."

Lindsay watched a smile play around Eva Jones's lips, but it
never made it to her dark eyes. "I'm really weary of arguing with
you archaeologists who think that everything that is ever lost in
this world has to either stay where it fell or wait for you to pick it up. I operate within the law. That's all you need to know." She
turned and left. John followed her out. They all watched her until
she was out of sight over the dam walls.

"Well, what do you make of that?" asked Lindsay.

"The Coast Guard paid her a visit and she didn't like it," Trey
said.

"What's she looking for out there?" asked Juliana.

Trey seemed deep in thought as he shook his head in reply.

The day ended for Lindsay and the crew at three o'clock.
Discounting the hour she had for lunch, with only brief breaks, she
had been lying on the narrow plank for eight hours. She stood and
stretched her tired muscles. Bobbie stood beside her and yawned,
covering her mouth with a clean spot on her forearm. Lindsay
wanted to rub her eyes, but she had removed her gloves for the
intricate parts of the excavation and her hands were covered with
dark gray sandy muck. Instead, she closed her eyes tight, then
opened them to see people coming down the scaffolding like an
invading force. They were the night crew. They arrived early to be
shown by the day crew what had to be done during the next shift.

Lindsay was loath to give up her skeleton to someone else, but
she understood the need to excavate the site as quickly as possible.
Her replacements were a couple of Trey's new graduate students
whom she had seen around the department. She showed them
how to proceed from where she and Bobbie had left off. One of the
guys was a little defensive about being told how to do his job. The
other was happy to be working on such an interesting find.
Lindsay wondered how well they would work together. Satisfied
that they knew what to do, she and Bobbie left them to it. Lindsay
retrieved her notebook from the field desk and climbed the stairway to the top of the cofferdam.

"You'll be rooming with me. I hope you don't mind," said
Bobbie.

"No. That'll be nice. We have a cabin on one of the barges, is
that right?"

"Yes. I hope you don't get seasick. If you do, they can find a
place for you in the lab on the island. A few of the crew stay there."

"I think I'll adjust." Lindsay stood in the sand at the top of the dam with Bobbie and the rest of the crew and looked down into
the pit where the night crew continued the excavation. She could
see little difference from when she had started that morning.
Disentombing the Estrella de Espana would be a long and slow
process.

The dock of the cofferdam had a gangplank leading to the barge
Winchester. The barge wafted gently in the water, and Lindsay stood
for a moment after coming aboard, adjusting to the movement, getting her sea legs. The barge had a large deck in comparison to its
cabin area. Perfect for the kind of work they were putting it to.

She followed Bobbie past rows of the Estrella's timbers covered
with sea-soaked blankets, past the screens used to separate artifacts from sand and mud, to a place where some of the crew were
gathered rinsing their hands with a hose. Lindsay cleaned the mud
from her hands, frowning at the grit under her nails.

Their boots were loud on the metal floor and the sounds of their
footsteps echoed off the metal walls as Bobbie led her down a
hatchway into a barely lit narrow hallway.

"We have the third room on the right."

Lindsay had to duck her head going into the small, sparse
room, furnished only with two twin-size beds, a desk, a sink, and
a single closet.

"I have the far bed, if that's all right?" asked Bobbie.

"Sure." Lindsay's bags had been put on the remaining stripped
bed. She slid them under the bed and opened the single small
closet. Her scuba gear was neatly stored beside Bobbie's. "So this
is home."

Bobbie grinned. "You'll get used to it. You brought sheets and
stuff, I hope."

"Yes, everything on Trey's list. Where's the-"

"Turn left out the door, to the end of the hall, and hang a right.
It's the first door on the left. About half of us have to use it, so
showers are quick."

"I imagine this time of day there's a line at the shower."

"Yep. If you have to go, the toilet has its own little closet."

Lindsay heard the barge's engine come to life and cover the
noise of the ocean with a humming-puffing-tapping sound that
settled into a rhythm. Gears ground as the capstan pulled up the
anchors, and she felt the barge lurch gently as it moved away from
the dock.

"Every day we take the timber and other artifacts to the lab on
St. Magdalena. There's a big fabricated-metal warehouse with
brine holding tanks for the timber. We have the end-of-the-day
meeting in the lab from four till five, then we're through for the
evening." Bobbie fished a towel and washcloth from her side of the
closet and headed for the door. "We're sharing lab space on St.
Maggie with the biologists. Don't expect them to be friendly. This
is a research preserve, and Lewis came in with big bucks and kind
of took over a lot of their space."

Lindsay lucked out. She was third in line to get a shower just
behind Bobbie. The stall was small and plain, but it had running
water. Lindsay knew how to take quick showers. Inside of seven
minutes she was back in her cabin, clean and refreshed.

"Chamberlain, phone call." The voice was just outside the door.

"The phone's in the hall." Bobbie opened the door and pointed
Lindsay to a recess a few feet from their door.

"Rabbit, this is John."

He hadn't needed to tell her who he was. John West was the
only person in the world who called her Rabbit.

"You settled in?"

"Yes, the accommodations are quite nice, compared to many
sites I've worked at."

"Why don't I take you to dinner? It's your first night. We can go
up the intracoastal waterway to a seafood place I know near
Fernandina."

"I'd like that. What should I wear?" There was silence for a long
moment. John was evidently not prepared for a fashion consultation. Lindsay smiled into the phone. "Will slacks and a blouse be
all right?"

"Fine. I'll meet you at St. Magdalena."

Bobbie's white halter top and khaki shorts contrasted well with
her brown skin and black hair. She had pulled her still-damp hair
up into a ponytail and was slipping her feet into a pair of brown
sandals when Lindsay returned.

"So, going out to dinner with West?" Bobbie grinned. "Gina
and Juliana are going to be envious."

"Well, it ought to be interesting. He really hates my work."

"Gives you something good to talk about."

"What are you doing this evening?"

"A group of us are going to eat on the barge and hang out with Sarah. She's really spooked about what happened. And that guy
from the Coast Guard didn't help, either."

I imagine you're kind of spooked, too. Don't be too upset over
the Coast Guard. Everything's probably old hat to them and they
forget to be sensitive."

"He acted like we did it."

"I don't think he really thought that. This excavation has given
him more work to deal with and he doesn't like it-"

"That's funny about the Jones woman showing up, isn't it?"
Bobbie checked herself out in the mirror over the sink.

"I was kind of surprised." Lindsay put on an aquamarine cotton short-sleeved blouse and a pair of white slacks. "Is this all right
for the restaurants along the coast? John wasn't able to help."

"Sure, that's fine. You look great."

"I think she was scoping out the place." Lindsay ran a brush
through her long hair and pulled it up into a ponytail.

"For what? A raid?"

"Just to see what we're up to, to see maybe if we've found anything valuable. Or, to let us know that, if it was her men, it won't
happen again."

Lindsay slipped on a pair of white leather sandals, grabbed a
light sweater, and went up top with Bobbie. The barge was almost
to the island. St. Magdalena was only five miles from the dam and,
even though the barge moved very slowly, it took less than thirty
minutes to reach the dock. Some of the crew were preparing to offload the timber to be taken to the brine tanks. Lindsay followed
Bobbie down a wooden walkway toward the main building.

The Magdalena House was a large dark cedar three-story structure that fit into the flora of the island as if it had grown there. The
first floor, largely concealed by the wraparound deck above it, sat
on top of the ground. It was covered with stone and had only a
small closed window and one door that Lindsay could see. The
second story, the one they were about to enter, had large double
doors and glass picture windows on at least two sides. The topfloor windows were regular size with closed rattan blinds. A satellite dish sat on the roof, pointing at some spot in the sky.

Beside the walkway, separated from them only by height and
railing, was an alligator pond. Lindsay searched the surface of the
pond and spotted the brow ridge, head, and back of an alligator, so
still in the water it could have been a log.

"Guard dog?" Lindsay asked.

"Spooky, huh? Can't you almost hear the clock in his stomach
ticking?"

Lindsay and Bobbie walked up the wooden ramp to the deck
and entered a reception area decorated with racks of brochures,
hanging plants, and prints of local flora and fauna. There was no
receptionist. Lindsay suspected that Lewis had stopped most of
the tours of the island until the excavation was finished. There
weren't many anyway. This was one of the islands used as an
experimental habitat for breeding colonies of several rare species
of animals.

"The conservation lab is on the ground floor," said Bobbie.
"There're some offices up here and a few apartments upstairs. The
translator stays up there. You've met Harper, haven't you? I think
Trey has a thing for her."

A woman rounded the corner and almost ran into them. "Oh,
someone else," she said, looking at Lindsay. "I hope you don't
intend to stay here. It's getting rather crowded."

"Tessa." Bobbie smiled. "Nice of you to greet us. This is Dr.
Chamberlain. She's staying on the barge."

"Good. I think I should tell you that a group of us are signing a
petition to get you all moved off the island. You can't just come
here and take everything away from us. Our work is importantmore important than yours." She paused, frustration clear on her
angry face. "We were here first."

Bobbie cocked an eyebrow. "I'll tell you right now, that argument won't work. Look, this isn't going to be forever."

"Oh, you haven't heard?" She brandished a letter in their faces.
"Lewis is planning to build a museum on the island. Listen, the
environment won't be able to recover from the number of tourists
that will be required to make such an enterprise pay off." Tessa's
face had turned red, and Lindsay could see she was having to
strain to hold back tears. "We have always worked well with you
archaeologists. How could you do this to us-to the island? There
aren't many untouched islands left."

"A museum?" asked Lindsay.

"Yes, and he wants to make the island a theme park." Tessa
almost sobbed.

"I really doubt that. Whatever you think of Lewis, he's an
archaeologist, not Walt Disney," Lindsay said, trying to get a look at the letter the woman held in her hand. It looked like a fax, but
she couldn't see for sure.

Others from the barge came through the doors, talking and
laughing. Tessa threw up her hands and started to leave, when
they heard a splash and yells of distress just beyond the entrance.

LINDSAY AND BOBBIE rushed outside. Several people leaned over the
railing, looking into the pond and yelling at an elderly man who
was splashing wildly, cursing, and clearly not listening to the profusion of advice from above.

"Oh, Christ, it's Boote. I'll bet he's drunk." The voice sounded
like Tessa's, but Lindsay didn't look behind her, instead she hurried to the scene and saw that a piece of lower railing had come
loose.

"We need to help him," Lindsay said. "If he is drunk, he probably can't help himself."

She looked over at the alligator. It was as still as a log in the
same spot on the other side of the pond. She started to kneel down,
but felt herself gently pushed aside.

"Boote, old man," said John West, kneeling and reaching out
toward him. "Don't make me have to come in and drag you out of
there. Swim toward me."

The alligator submerged and someone yelled. Boote, as if just
realizing where he was, darted his head back and forth, looking,
then panicked, flailed his arms, and went under.