"It's important," said Hatch. "But private."
Neidelman looked at him a moment longer. Then he glanced at his watch. "Listen up!" he said to the men. "Shift ends in seven minutes. Knock off, get topside, and tell the next team to come down for an early start."
The workers laid aside their tools and began climbing the ladder toward the lift. Streeter remained where he was, silent. The large suction hoses fell silent, and the half-filled bucket rose toward the surface, bobbing on its heavy steel cable. Streeter remained, standing silently to one side. Neidelman turned back to Hatch. "You've got five minutes, maybe ten."
"A couple of days ago," Hatch began, "I came across a stash of my grandfather's papers, documents he'd gathered about the Water Pit and Ockham's treasure. They were hidden in the attic of the family house; that's why my father never destroyed them. Some mentioned St. Michael's Sword. They hinted that the sword was some kind of terrible weapon the Spanish government planned to use against Red Ned Ockham. There were other disturbing references, too. So I contacted a researcher I know in Cadiz and asked her to do some more digging into the sword's history."
Neidelman looked toward the muddy ground at their feet, his lips pursed. "That could be considered proprietary information. I'm surprised you took such a step without consulting me."
"She found this." Hatch reached into his jacket and handed Neidelman a piece of paper.
The Captain looked at it briefly. "It's in old Spanish," he said with a frown.
"Below is my friend's translation."
Neidelman handed it back. "Summarize it for me," he said curtly.
"It's fragmentary. But it describes the original discovery of St. Michael's Sword, and what happened afterwards."
Neidelman raised his eyebrows. "Indeed?"
"During the Black Plague, a wealthy Spanish merchant set out from Cadiz with his family on a barque. They crossed the Mediterranean and put ashore along an unpopulated stretch of the Barbary Coast. There they found the remains of an ancient Roman settlement. They settled down to ride out the plague. Some friendly Berber tribesmen warned them not to go near a ruined temple that lay on a hill some distance away, saying it was cursed. The warnings were repeated several times. After a while, when the plague started to abate, the merchant decided to explore the temple. Maybe he felt the Berbers had hidden something of value, and he didn't want to depart without taking a look. It seems that among the ruins he found a slab of marble behind an altar. Underneath was an ancient metal box that had been sealed shut, with an inscription in Latin. In effect, the inscription stated that the box contained a sword, which was the deadliest of weapons. Even to look upon it meant death. He had the box carried down to the ship, but the Berbers refused to help him open it. In fact, they drove him from the shore."
Neidelman listened, still looking at the ground.
"A few weeks later, on Michaelmas—St. Michael's Day—the merchant's ship was found drifting in the Mediterranean. The yard-arms were covered with vultures. All hands were dead. The box was shut, but the lead seal had been broken. It was brought to a monastery at Cadiz. The monks read the Latin inscription, along with the merchant's own log. They decided the sword was—and I quote from my friend's translation—a fragment vomited up from Hell itself. They sealed the box again and placed it in the catacombs under the cathedral. The document ends by saying that the monks who handled the box soon fell ill and died."
Neidelman looked up at Hatch. "Is this supposed to have some kind of bearing on our current effort?"
"Yes," said Hatch steadily. "Very much so."
"Enlighten me, then."
"Wherever St. Michael's Sword has been, people have died. First, the merchant's family. Then the monks. And when Ockham snaps it up, eighty of his crew die right here on the island. Six months later, Ockham's ship is found drifting just like the merchant ship, with all hands dead."
"Interesting story," Neidelman said. "But I don't think it's worth stopping work for me to listen to. This is the twentieth century. It has no bearing on us."
"That's where you're wrong. Haven't you noticed the recent rash of illnesses among the crew?"
Neidelman shrugged. "Sickness always occurs in a group of this size. Especially when people are becoming tired and the work is dangerous."
"This isn't malingering we're talking about. I've done the blood work. In almost every case, the white cell counts are extremely low. And just this afternoon, one of your digging team came into my office with the most unusual skin disorder I've ever seen. He had ugly rashes and swelling across his arms, thighs, and groin."
"What is it?" Neidelman asked.
"I don't know yet. I've checked my medical references, and I haven't been able to make a specific diagnosis yet. If I didn't know better, I'd say they were buboes."
Neidelman looked at Hatch with a raised eyebrow. "Black death? Bubonic plague, in twentieth-century Maine?"
"As I said, I haven't been able to diagnose it yet."
Neidelman frowned. "Then what are you rabbiting on about?"
Hatch took a breath, controlling his temper. "Gerard, I don't know exactly what St. Michael's Sword is. But it's obviously very dangerous. It's left a trail of death wherever it's gone. I wonder if we were right, assuming that the Spanish meant to wield the sword against Ockham. Perhaps he was meant to capture it."
"Ah," Neidelman nodded, an edge of sarcasm distorting his voice. "Perhaps the sword is cursed after all?" Streeter, standing to one side, sniffed derisively.
"You know I don't believe in curses any more than you do," Hatch snapped. "That doesn't mean there isn't some underlying physical cause to the legend. Like an epidemic. This sword has all the characteristics of a Typhoid Mary."
"And that would explain why several of our sick crew have bacterial infections, while another has viral pneumonia, and yet another a weird infection of the teeth. Just what kind of epidemic might this be, Doctor?"
Hatch looked at the lean face. "I know the diversity of diseases is puzzling. The point is, the sword is dangerous. We've got to figure out how and why before we plunge ahead and retrieve it."
Neidelman nodded, smiling distantly. "I see. You can't figure out why the crew is sick. You're not even sure what some of them are sick of. But the sword is somehow responsible for everything."
"It isn't just the illnesses," Hatch countered. "You must know that a big Nor'easter is brewing. If it keeps heading our way, it'll make last week's storm look like a spring shower. It would be crazy to continue."
"Crazy to continue," Neidelman repeated. "And just how do you propose to stop the dig?"
Hatch paused for a moment as this sunk in. "By appealing to your good sense," he said, as calmly as he could.
There was a tense silence. "No," said Neidelman, with a heavy tone of finality. "The dig continues."
"Then your stubbornness leaves me no choice. I'm going to have to shut down the dig myself for the season, effective immediately."
"How, exactly?"
"By invoking clause nineteen of our contract."
Nobody spoke.
"My clause, remember?" Hatch went on. "Giving me the right to stop the dig if I felt conditions had become too dangerous."
Slowly, Neidelman fished his pipe out of a pocket and loaded it with tobacco. "Funny," he said in a quiet, dead voice, turning to Streeter. "Very funny, isn't it, Mr. Streeter? Now that we're only thirty hours from the treasure chamber, Dr. Hatch here wants to shut the whole operation down."
"In thirty hours," Hatch said, "the storm may be right on top of us—"
"Somehow," the Captain interrupted, "I'm not at all convinced it's the sword, or the storm, that you're really worried about. And these papers of yours are medieval mumbo jumbo, if they're real at all. I don't see why you . . ." He paused. Then something dawned in his eyes. "But yes. Of course I see why. You have another motive, don't you?"