But speaking of which … the Right Reverend Wallach, a worthless milquetoast who couldn’t stir a bowl of Cheerios much less a congregation, ascended to the pulpit with a Bible in one hand and in the other a white life preserver from the Neptune II, which he hung from a hook attached to the lectern. It was not the first time the hook had been used for that purpose, nor would it be the last. The Bering Sea wasn’t getting any kinder.
“We are gathered here today,” the reverend said, “in remembrance of the good men who lost their lives doing what they did so well, and with such joy.”
Ten seconds in, and Charlie had already nearly guffawed. Anybody who thought crabbers did it for the fun of it was out of his mind. It was just about the worst work in the world. He’d done it for years, before the first Neptune went down, and hadn’t missed it for a single minute since. Extending his ministry was what he lived for now, and to that end he would do whatever he had to. Or, more to the point, whatever Harley, and his pals Eddie and Russell, had to do. Before the service, he’d spotted those other two losers smoking a joint outside.
Harley had already broached the subject of the job to them, so Charlie wasn’t going to have to waste a lot of time on persuasion. Getting onto St. Peter’s Island, and digging up graves that might still be sealed in the permafrost, was going to require a lot of hard work. What bothered Charlie was that he’d let this potential gold mine sit there, right under his nose, his whole life. Was it Providence that had finally opened his eyes? If there was more treasure where that emerald-embossed cross had come from, he was finally going to have the resources to do whatever he wanted. He’d be able to flood the whole planet with the holy word. Jesus might have put the stash in his way for that very reason.
And who knew how much of it there might be?
Ever since he’d found the cross in Harley’s anorak, he’d been digging through Internet sites, ordering books and downloading monographs, even posing as a professor at the University of Alaska in order to call up a couple of experts on Russian history and grill them. And everything he’d learned — like the fact that the colony was founded by a batch of fanatical Siberians who had settled on the island between 1910 and 1918—only whetted his appetite more.
“We are going to hear today from members of the lost men’s families,” the reverend was droning on. “And also from the captain of the unfortunate vessel capsized on that fateful night, for he alone lived to tell the tale.”
And a tale it would be, Charlie thought.
“Let us begin,” the reverend said, “with Mr. Muller, the father of the youngest crewman, Lucas.”
As Muller, who ran a hardware supply store, stepped solemnly to the pulpit, Charlie tapped his fingers impatiently on his knees. He was still pondering his latest findings. Turns out, these Siberians had been followers of the mad monk, Rasputin, the one who had bewitched the last Tsar and Tsaritsa of Russia. The Romanovs. Some of this stuff had come back to him from school — you couldn’t grow up in Alaska and know nothing about the Russians who lived right across the strait — but what he hadn’t known about was the Romanov jewels. He hadn’t known that the Tsar and his family had owned one of the most astonishing collections of jewelry the world had ever seen.
And that a lot of it was still missing to this day.
“My boy never failed at anything he put his mind to,” Mr. Muller was saying. “He was smart as a whip and worked as hard as any man I ever knew.”
Charlie knew that the blame for the shipwreck had been attributed to Lucas’s piloting of the boat, and he guessed that this was the father’s way of redeeming his son’s reputation. He hoped that Harley wouldn’t decide to ad-lib and rub any salt in that wound.
As Muller yielded the pulpit to the Samoan sailor’s mother, Charlie went over the list in his mind again — the endless array of tiaras and necklaces, earrings and bracelets, gilded crosses and enameled eggs — eggs, made by some jeweler named Fabergé—that had comprised the royal collection. The Tsaritsa, infatuated with her holy man from the steppes, had given him lavish presents, and there were even rumors that she had become his mistress. But who would ever know, or give a damn, about that now? All that mattered to Charlie was the obvious value of the cross — and the fact that it had been found on the island. If the cross was there, the rest of the missing Romanov jewels might be there, too.
The Samoan’s mother had given way to Farrell’s sister, and then to an engineering buddy of Old Man Richter, and it was finally time for Harley, who slouched to the pulpit like a man about to be hanged. Charlie wanted to holler at him to straighten up, but he was relieved to see him take out the comments Charlie had written for him and start reading.
Rebekah nodded approvingly, and glanced over at Charlie with her beady, hard eyes. Bathsheba had put down whatever trashy book she’d brought and was actually paying some attention.
“Mankind is forever caught in the crosshairs of God’s grace,” Harley was saying — a line Charlie was particularly fond of. “Belief is the path that we all must take. That path will lead us through the trials and tribulations of life, and protect us from the many evils and the countless plagues that assail us. Even as I clung to the lid of that coffin, I trusted in God to deliver me to shore.”
Charlie knew that God was probably the last thing on Harley’s mind that night, but it sure sounded good. Harley then read Charlie’s account of all the other deeply religious revelations he’d had as he fought his way through the freezing sea — full of doubts and fears — before landing on the shore, where his faith had finally deposited him.
“I only wish that I had been able to save my fellow crew members who had shared in that awful voyage with me,” he concluded. “But I do know now that they are all resting, safe and dry, in God’s loving hands.”
When he wrapped up, Charlie wanted to applaud, or maybe even proclaim in some way that those were his words, but he just didn’t see how to do it gracefully. The mayor got up next — big surprise — and made some remarks that she probably thought would help get her elected again (as if anybody in his right mind would want the job, anyway) before the Reverend Wallach recited the Lord’s Prayer, and announced that hot drinks and refreshments were now being served in the annex.
“I do okay?” Harley shuffled over to ask his brother. He stuffed the paper into the back pocket of his jeans.
“You mumbled some of the lines, but yeah, it was fine.”
“You’re supposed to make eye contact,” Rebekah put in.
“I didn’t ask you.”
“Well, if you’d been smart, you would have.”
There was no love lost, Charlie knew, between his brother and Rebekah. Until the sisters had shown up, Harley had lived in the old family homestead, too, but once the women had taken over, Harley, and his pet snake, had been none too subtly eased out the door.
“I thought you did good,” Bathsheba said shyly.
“Where are the idiots?” Charlie asked, and Harley, knowing exactly who he was referring to, looked around the emptying church. “Over in the annex, I guess.”
“Get them and meet me out at the van.”
Rebekah wheeled him back outside, then went to join her sister at the refreshment tables. Charlie knew the two sisters would be about as welcome there as ants at a picnic.