Douglas Preston: Riptide

"Ever been to New York, Johnny?" he asked.

Johnny nodded solemnly. "Once. Before you were born."

What a lie, Malin thought. As if Johnny would remember anything that had happened when he was less than two years old. But saying so out loud would be to risk a swift punch in the arm.

Malin's eye fell on the small outboard tied at the end of the dock. And he suddenly had an idea. A really good idea.

"Let's take it out," he said, lowering his voice and nodding at the skiff.

"You're crazy," Johnny said. "Dad would whip us good."

"Come on," Malin said. "They're having lunch at the Hastings after they finish shopping. They won't be back until three, maybe four. Who's gonna know?"

"Just the whole town, that's all, seeing us going out there."

"Nobody's gonna be watching," said Malin. Then, recklessly, he added, "Who's chicken now?"

But Johnny did not seem to notice this liberty. His eyes were on the boat. "So where do you want to go that's so great, anyway?" he asked.

Despite their solitude, Malin lowered his voice further. "Ragged Island."

Johnny turned toward him. "Dad'll kill us," he whispered.

"He won't kill us if we find the treasure."

"There's no treasure," Johnny said scornfully, but without much conviction. "Anyway, it's dangerous out there, with all those pits."

Malin knew enough about his brother to recognize the tone in his voice. Johnny was interested. Malin kept quiet, letting the monotonous morning solitude do his persuading for him.

Abruptly, Johnny stood up and strode to the end of the dock. Malin waited, an anticipatory thrill coursing through him. When his brother returned, he was holding a life preserver in each hand.

"When we land, we don't go farther than the rocks along the shore." Johnny's voice was deliberately gruff, as if to remind Malin that simply having one good idea didn't alter their balance of power. "Understand?"

Malin nodded, holding the gunwale while Johnny tossed in his satchel and the life preservers. He wondered why they hadn't thought of doing this before. Neither boy had ever been to Ragged Island. Malin didn't know any kids in the town of Stormhaven who ever had, either. It would make a great story to tell their friends.

"You sit in the bow," Johnny said, "and I'll drive."

Malin watch Johnny fiddle with the shift lever, open the choke, pump the gas bulb, then yank the starter cord. The engine coughed, then fell silent. Johnny yanked again, then again. Ragged Island was six miles offshore, but Malin figured they could make it in a half hour on such a smooth sea. It was close to high tide, when the strong currents that swept the island dropped down to nothing before reversing.

Johnny rested, his face red, and then turned again for a heroic yank. The engine sputtered into life. "Cast off!" he shouted. As soon as the rope was uncleated, Johnny shoved the throttle all the way forward, and the tinny little eighteen-horsepower engine whined with exertion. The boat surged from the dock and headed out past Breed's Point into the bay, wind and spray stinging Malin's face delightfully.

The boat sent back a creamy wake as it sliced through the ocean. There had been a massive storm the week before, but as usual it seemed to have settled the surface, and the water was glassy. Now Old Hump appeared to starboard, a low naked dome of granite, streaked with seagull lime and fringed with dark seaweed. As they buzzed through the channel, countless seagulls, drowsing one-legged on the rock, raised their heads and stared at the boat with bright yellow eyes. A single pair rose into the sky, then wheeled past, crying a lost cry.

"This was a great idea," Malin said. "Wasn't it, Johnny?" "Maybe," Johnny said. "But if we get caught, it was your idea." Even though their father owned Ragged Island, they had been forbidden to visit it for as long as he could remember. Their dad hated the place and never talked about it. Schoolyard legend held that countless people had been killed there digging for treasure; that the place was cursed; that it harbored ghosts. There were so many pits and shafts dug over the years that the island's innards were completely rotten, ready to swallow the unwary visitor. He'd even heard about the Curse Stone. It had been found in the Pit many years before, and now it was supposedly kept in a special room deep in the church basement, locked up tight because it was the work of the devil. Johnny once told him that when kids were really bad in Sunday School, they were shut up in the crypt with the Curse Stone. He felt another shiver of excitement.

The island lay dead ahead now, wreathed in clinging tatters of mist. In winter, or on rainy days, the mist turned to a suffocating, pea-soup fog. On this bright summer day, it was more like translucent cotton candy. Johnny had tried to explain the local rip currents that caused it, but Malin hadn't understood and was pretty sure Johnny didn't, either.

The mist approached the boat's prow and suddenly they were in a strange twilit world, the motor muffled. Almost unconsciously, Johnny slowed down. Then they were through the thickest of it and ahead Malin could see the Ragged Island ledges, their cruel seaweed-covered flanks softened by the mist.

They brought the skiff through a low spot in the ledges. As the sea-level mist cleared, Malin could see the greenish tops of jagged underwater rocks, covered with waving seaweed; the kind of rocks so feared by lobstermen at low tide or in heavy fog. But now the tide was high, and the little motorboat slid past effortlessly. After an argument about who was to get his feet wet, they grounded on the cobbled shore. Malin jumped out with the painter and pulled the boat up, feeling the water squish in his sneakers.

Johnny stepped out onto dry land. "Pretty neat," he said noncommittally, shouldering his satchel and looking inland.

Just up from the stony beach, the sawgrass and chokecherry bushes began. The scene was lit by an eerie silver light, filtered through the ceiling of mist that still hung above their heads. A huge iron boiler, at least ten feet high, rose above the nearby grass, covered with massive rivets and rusted a deep orange. There was a split down one side, ragged and petalled. Its upper half was cloaked by the low-lying mists.

"I bet that boiler blew up," Johnny said.

"Bet it killed somebody," Malin added with relish.

"Bet it killed two people."

The cobbled beach ended at the seaward point of the island in ridges of wave-polished granite. Malin knew that fishermen passing through the Ragged Island Channel called these rocks the Whalebacks. He scrambled up the closest of the Whalebacks and stood high, trying to see over the bluffs into the island.

"Get down!" Johnny yelled. "Just what do you think you're gonna see in all this mist? Idiot."

"Takes one to know one—" Malin began, climbing down, and received a brotherly rap on the head for his troubles.

"Stay behind me," Johnny said. "We'll circle the shore, then head back." He walked quickly along the bottom of the bluffs, his tanned legs chocolate brown in the dim light. Malin followed, feeling aggrieved. It was his idea to come out here, but Johnny always took over.

"Hey!" Johnny yelled. "Look!" He bent down, picking up something long and white. "It's a bone."

"No, it isn't," Malin replied, still feeling annoyed. Coming to the island was his idea. He should have been the one to find it.

"It is, too. And I bet it's from a man." Johnny swung the thing back and forth like a baseball bat. "It's the leg bone off somebody who got killed trying to get the treasure. Or a pirate, maybe. I'm gonna take it home and keep it under my bed."

Curiosity overcame Malin's annoyance. "Let me see," he said.

Johnny handed him the bone. It felt surprisingly heavy and cold, and it smelled bad. "Yuck," Malin said, hastily handing it back.