Just friends, Whit thought, right.
Iris tapped the photos with her fingernail. ‘So I dove into the historical archives, called a professor friend of mine in Mexico City to run some local checks down there for me. A large cache of the original silver and gold coins minted at Monteblanco – with this unusual double-rosette design – was being shipped to Spain right after being minted, aboard a schooner called Santa Barbara. But according to the records, Santa Barbara was lost at sea in March of 1820, somewhere south of Cuba.’
‘I see,’ Whit said again. 1820. Jean Laffite’s time. His heart neared his throat. This would make Jason Salinger’s day.
‘But the records of the time indicate that the weather was fair throughout that time in the Caribbean. So Santa Barbara probably didn’t fall victim to a Gulf storm.’
Whit cleared his throat. ‘I will embarrass myself a little now. But what if the coins were buried, as part of a treasure?’
‘Yeah, I didn’t tell Iris that part,’ Parker said. ‘I didn’t want to influence her data.’
‘You couldn’t have,’ Iris said dryly, ‘You’re talking about the locks. The latches I identified. They’re from the same period as the coins. You think the coins were originally buried with those relics and skeletons?’
Whit lowered his voice, leaned forward. ‘Yes, I do. I think Jean Laffite took Santa Barbara as his last prize, and he had no time to take and bank it under a false name in New Orleans. He was forced out of Galveston in the spring of 1820. Navies from Britain, Spain, and the US would have been hunting him in the Gulf. He had no base to hide, nowhere to run.’
‘So you think he buried the Santa Barbara stash, hoping to reestablish later,’ Iris said.
‘He just never got reestablished,’ Whit said. ‘Is this too big of a jump?’
Iris Dominguez sipped at her beer. ‘The coins have to have been somewhere for the past one hundred eighty years. They’re worn but not from human handling.’
He thought of Lucy, her claim the coins were Patch’s. ‘You don’t think they’ve been in a collection all these years?’
‘No, Judge, considering what else you’ve discovered, I don’t think so.’ She closed her eyes. ‘Oh my God, the historical significance. Enormous. An actual buried pirate treasure.’
Whit’s throat felt dry. ‘More valuable than the monetary significance?’
‘I don’t know. I’ll see if I can locate a copy of the manifest from Santa Barbara from the archives. See how much gold and silver it carried – but even manifests didn’t always represent an accurate count. There was a lot of corruption, theft in the financial system then. Sometimes up to forty percent of the treasure on a ship wouldn’t even be on the manifest, to minimize taxes. And the Monteblanco mint was destroyed in a peasant uprising in 1822. Coins from Monteblanco are exceedingly rare.’
‘It could be quite large, then.’
‘It could be millions, Whit. The accounts of Santa Barbara I found also mentioned that the ship carried a noted Colombian emerald. No emeralds in Mexico – it’s not a gem-rich geography – but lots of incredible emeralds out of Colombia. This one was particularly noteworthy. The Catholic priests nicknamed it the Devil’s Eye.’
‘Oh, Lord,’ Whit said. He thought of Claudia’s story of Danny Laffite’s demands. ‘The archives in Mexico. Do they have any information on this emerald they could send to me?’
‘I’ll ask,’ Dr Dominguez said.
‘Judge, what is it? What’s wrong?’ Dr Parker asked.
‘You don’t happen to know the value of the emerald, do you?’
‘I should imagine it to be worth a few million. And of course, if it’s become Laffite’s treasure, and it’s provable, then the value probably triples,’ Dr Dominguez said.
‘Iris,’ Whit said, ‘can you help me find out how someone might try to sell this Devil’s Eye? Or these coins?’
‘Sure.’ She shook her head in pleased amazement. ‘Actual pirate treasure.’
‘Actual pirates,’ Parker said. ‘Can I keep those bones for a while? They just got way more interesting to me. They must have been the unlucky bastards who helped Laffite bury the treasure, then got killed for their trouble. Dead men tell no tales and so on.’
‘So you’re the famous Whit.’ Ben Vaughn sat on the edge of the hospital bed, dressed in loose khakis and a T-shirt.
‘I didn’t know I was famous.’
‘To Claudia and the FBI. Claudia thinks the world of you.’ He didn’t say what the FBI thought.
‘I think a lot of her, too,’ Whit said, and it didn’t quite come out right and Ben glanced up toward him. ‘Thanks for agreeing to see me.’
‘What did you want to talk about?’
Whit sat on the edge of the room’s institutional recliner. ‘Your brother. I saw him.’
‘So I heard.’ Ben sat up. ‘The FBI told me.’
‘Where’s he at, Ben?’
‘I think the same gang that was after us took him. He was the initial target.’
‘So Danny Laffite kidnapped your brother and sank his own boat?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Maybe Stoney hid so this same gang couldn’t find him.’
‘Maybe.’ Ben sounded less sure.
‘But he… what, leaves you and Claudia to die? Not very brotherly.’
Ben said nothing. The bruise on his cheek had gotten nastier with the passing hours, turning black and lemon-yellow. ‘I told Claudia he wouldn’t abandon us.’
‘He just didn’t want to tell the police.’
‘He didn’t want to endanger our lives.’
Whit sat next to him. ‘I have five older brothers. Two of them I’m extremely close to. Two I’m not so close to but I love them very much. One I practically hate but I still love him at the same time. He’s a prime-grade asshole but he’s still, and always will be, my brother. He matters to me.’
Ben said nothing.
‘You’re not helping him, Ben. If you know where he might be, tell us. We all need some answers from him.’
‘Listen, Stoney was in a panic. For all the swagger, he’s not good with situations he’s not firmly in control of or can’t get control of.’
‘All his brokerage firm’s computer systems were down.’
‘Well, see…’
‘But Stoney took them down, Ben. He sabotaged his own network from his home PC. I just saw the computer forensics report; the Corpus police sent copies to the sheriff’s office here. He broke the systems so he couldn’t transfer the ransom funds.’
Ben stared at his bare feet. ‘That still doesn’t mean he hasn’t been kidnapped.’
‘Your brother financed treasure dives in Florida. I’d like to know more about those.’
‘And you’re here exactly in what capacity?’ Ben said.
‘Tuesday I’m conducting a formal inquest – a hearing – into the murders of Patch Gilbert and Thuy Tran. You heard about that?’
‘Yeah.’
‘The guy who’s the number one suspect and who apparently killed himself had some rather rare and valuable gold coins in his pocket. They’ve been identified as being from the same time period as Jean Laffite’s pirating.’ Ben’s eyes widened. ‘I don’t think Danny Laffite sounds quite so crazy now, do you?’
‘Listen, Danny Laffite was a nutcase. Ask any of Stoney’s friends who are in this Laffite League. Stoney was the big fish in that pond, lot of money, well-known, popular. He was the leader and that’s who a loser like Danny gloms on to. I think, if there’s any truth to this, Danny Laffite had some delusion about Stoney knowing where this treasure was and thinking Stoney wouldn’t tell him.’ He stood, a little shaky. Whit steadied him.
‘I’m fine.’ Ben flinched slightly at Whit’s touch on his elbow.
‘Sorry. I know you’ve been through an ordeal. I-’
‘I know my brother a lot better than you do, Judge. You’re Claudia’s friend, and I know you both mean well. But you’re wrong. My brother wouldn’t risk my life like you say.’ He walked into the bathroom, splashed cold water on his face.
‘Did you ever hear Danny or Gar or Zack mention a guy named Alex?’
‘No.’
‘How about Albert Exley?’
‘No.’
‘Allen Eck?’
‘No.’ Ben dried his face. ‘I think, y’all find out who the other two kidnappers are, you’re not going to find they got any kind of treasure or archaeological connection. They didn’t give a shit about what Danny raved about. They used him, thought he was nuts. He had the boat and he’d given them a good target in my brother. They just wanted cash, pure and simple, and they thought they had a low-risk way to get it.’ He paused. ‘Maybe Danny Laffite killed those people on the Point, with the dead guy you mentioned. What a freak.’