Letters… numbers…
And then he had an idea.
"Just for the hell of it, try these. Start from the left: seven… five… six… wait." Jack did a quick count on his fingers. "Okay, make the fourth eight, then five… four… one."
As the last wheel turned, Jack could hear the click of the bolt from where he stood.
"Christ almighty!" Tom looked up at him with a baffled expression. "How the hell…?"
"Seven wheels, seven letters in 'Gefreda.' I took a stab."
Tom grasped the lid on both sides and tilted it back. It moved easily, smoothly, without a single squeak from the rear hinges. Inside Jack saw an irregular blue dome. It took a few seconds to register that it was a piece of silk—dry silk.
Tom's hand moved toward it but stalled halfway there. Jack noticed a fine tremor in the fingers. Then they pushed forward and hesitated another heartbeat or two before pinching a fold of the silk and lifting it.
Jack blinked when he saw what lay beneath.
No gold, no jewels—not even close. An irregular, slightly oblong sphere, somewhat larger than a basketball, sat in the box. Looked like an ugly piece of slightly rotted fruit with a leathery, olive-hued rind.
"What the hell is that?"
"I… haven't a clue." Tom ran skittish fingers over the surface. "Jesus, it feels like skin."
Jack squatted next to him and gave it a feel. Cool, slightly rough to the touch. Yeah… like skin. Not necessarily human skin; some kind of hide?
"You think this is it?"
Tom glanced at him. "Is what?"
"That Lilitongue thing you talked about. Could this be it?"
"I don't know. I've never seen a drawing of it."
"Doesn't look like any tongue I've ever seen. It—" Jack pulled his hand away as an unsettling thought hit him. "You don't think its hide is made from tongues, do you?"
"No. It may not even be the Lilitongue." He reached his hands around it. "Help me get it out."
Jack got a grip on two sides and together they lifted the thing from the chest. At most it was only a quarter again larger than a basketball, but it was a hell of a lot heavier. As they moved it Jack squeezed it between his hands—not a hint of give.
Once it was out he could see that it had rested in a silk-lined well.
"Custom-made for it," he said.
They gently laid it on the rocking deck. Jack steadied it while Tom checked the chest, poking about, lifting it and shaking it. He pulled his diving knife from the sheath strapped to his leg and began prying at the insides. He worked the blade around the edge of the well and popped it out in one piece. Then he upended the chest and tapped its sides. Nothing dropped out.
He tossed the chest aside.
"Shit! Nothing! Not even a piece of parchment to tell us what it is!"
Jack couldn't help feeling a little sorry for him as he returned to the sphere. No treasure, just this weird-looking thing.
A thing that looked more than ever like a piece of fruit. It even had a little navel, like an orange, but thirty or so degrees above the lower pole.
"What do you think?" Jack said. "Man-made or organic?"
Tom didn't answer. He sat staring at the thing, his face a mask of disappointment. For an instant Jack thought he might cry.
"Tom? You okay?"
"Yeah." His voice was barely audible. "I heard you. Who gives a shit?"
"Take a guess."
Tom sighed. "Doesn't look man-made. I mean, it's got no seams."
Jack agreed. That hinted that it had grown somewhere. He wasn't sure he wanted to see the garden where it had been picked.
"Yeah… no seams." He reached over to where Tom had left his knife. "But let's see if we can make a few."
As Jack raised the blade Tom wrapped his arms around the sphere and hugged it like a mother protecting a child.
"Don't even think about it!"
"Don't you want to know what's inside?"
"Yes, but I don't want to ruin it. It could be some priceless relic, or it could have a stash of jewels inside."
"Well, you're never going to know if you don't take a peek."
"Right. But you can do that without cutting it open. Ever hear of X-ray?"
"You've got an X-ray machine?" Jack slapped the side of his face. "Wow! I knew this boat was high tech, but its own X-ray mach—"
"Put a sock in it, Jack. We're going to gas up and head back home tonight."
"We've still got some light left. Don't you want to see if there's anything else down here? Those doubloons you were talking about?"
Tom shook his head. "I think we've stayed long enough, don't you?"
Something wrong here. Jack was about to press it until he realized he'd be arguing against heading home. Home… he didn't want to delay his return a moment longer than absolutely necessary.
4
Tom stood watch over the afterdeck as a dockside pump filled the Sahbons tanks. He was sipping another kind of fueclass="underline" the Grey Goose he kept stashed in the pilothouse.
Instead of making the longer trip back to the sound, they'd cruised directly to St. George's where they returned the scuba gear and the pump, paying an extra fee for the time it would take a couple of men to drive out to Somerset and retrieve the truck. Then they found a marina for refueling.
Jack was ashore, buying food and ice, and calling Gia to let her know they were on their way home.
Tom took a deep sip from the coffee cup he was using as a glass. No ice aboard, so he was drinking it warm. He preferred it freezer cold, but warm vodka was better than no vodka.
Even with half a snootful he doubted he could find a way to put a positive spin on this trip situation.
Only one way to spin being locked out of his stash and learning that the feds knew more about him than he'd dreamed.
The good news—the trip's only good news—was that he was now the proud owner of the Lilitongue of Gefreda. At least he assumed that was what the ugly thing was.
He glanced toward the door to the pilothouse where they'd stowed it in its chest.
The bad news was that he had no idea what to do with it, or how to use it.
His initial elation had begun to die when he opened the chest and got a look at it. He hadn't known what to expect, but he'd never dreamed it would look like that. Despair crept in when he could find no word of explanation in the chest as to what it held or what it could do or how it could be used.
He put down his vodka and stepped below into the pilothouse. There he pulled his beat-up green canvas backpack from under his bunk. He un-zipped it and searched among the banded stacks of bills. He managed a smile. Would Jack ever be pissed if he saw this pile of cash.
There. Got it.
He pulled out a Xeroxed sheet, one he hadn't shown Jack: a copy of the inscription on the band around the Mendes map. He knew it by heart, but unfolded the sheet anyway and retranslated the ornate script.
Let this be the only record of the final resting place of the Lilitongue of Gefreda, known to the dark few as a means to elude all enemies and leave them helpless. Consigned to the depths near the Isle of Devils by order of the Holy Father. May no man exhume it from its watery grave.
He didn't know who "the dark few" were. Maybe Jesuits—they dressed in black, didn't they? But "a means to elude all enemies and leave them helpless" echoed through to his soul.
Tom couldn't think of anyone who more needed to elude his enemies. He'd wanted the map the instant he saw it. And lately, as he'd felt the noose tightening around his neck, the promise of the Lilitongue had called to him.
If he'd been able to grab his stash, he'd have had no need of the thing, wouldn't even have looked for it. But the cash in his backpack wasn't going to get him far. Might be enough to help him disappear for a while, but he'd need lots more to stay invisible.