Lubber! It was the most foolish thought I had ever had—Father Tide a lubber! But I didn’t know him well, not then.
He talked for several minutes; I believe he was trying to put me at my ease, and he succeeded. But at last he opened a briefcase.
“Jim,” he said, “look at this.” He took out a thick plastic envelope and spilled its contents on the desk before me.
“Do you recognize these articles?” he asked me solemnly.
I reached out and touched them.
But it was hardly necessary.
There was a worn silver ring, set with a milky Tonga pearl. There was a watch—a fine wrist chronometer in a plain case of stainless steel. There were coins and a few small bills—some of them American, the rest Marinian dollars. And there was a torn envelope.
I didn’t have to look at the address. I knew what it would be. It was for Mr. Stewart Eden, at his office in the undersea city of Thetis, Marinia.
I recognized them at once. The address on the envelope was my own writing. The ring was my uncle’s—the pearl a gift from his old friend Jason Craken. The watch was the one my father had given Uncle Stewart many a long year ago.
I said, as calmly as I could: “They are my uncle’s. Stewart Eden.”
Father Tide looked at me compassionately for a long, thoughtful moment.
Then he gathered up the articles and began to replace them in the plastic wrapper. “I was afraid they were,” he said softly.
“Has something happened to Uncle Stewart?” I demanded.
“I don’t know, Jim. I was hoping you could tell me.”
“Tell you? But how could I? Where did you get these things?”
Father Tide replaced the plastic envelope in his briefcase and looked at me across the desk.
“I found them in a sea-car,” he said softly. “Bear with me, Jim. Let me explain this my own way.”
He got up and began to pace restlessly around the room.
“Perhaps you know,” he said in that warm, clear voice, “that our order has pioneered in vulcanology and seismology—that is, in the scientific study of volcanoes and earthquakes. I myself am something of a specialist in the undersea phenomena associated with these things.”
I nodded uneasily.
“Two weeks ago,” he went on, pausing by the window to look out at the bright Bermudan sea, “there was a sudden eruption in the Indian Ocean. It was entirely unexpected.”
That made me speak. “Unexpected? But—I mean, sir, isn’t it true that these things can be forecast?”
He whirled and nodded. “Yes, Jim! It is very nearly a science these days. But this one was not forecast. There was nothing to indicate any activity in that area—nothing at all.
“But all the same the eruption occurred. I was at Krakatoa Dome when the waves from this disturbance were picked up by the seismographs there,” he went on deliberately. “The epicenter was less than two thousand miles away. I set out at once to make observations on the spot. By the following night I was at the epicenter.”
Though what he was saying told me nothing about what had happened to my uncle, it increased my respect for Father Tide. I couldn’t help being interested.
He told me: “The surface of the sea was still agitated. Beneath, I found a new flow of lava and mud that had spread over dozens of square miles. The lava was still hot, and the explosions of steam were considerable, even though my own sea-car is designed for use in the vicinity of seaquakes. I don’t suppose you know the area, but it is almost uninhabited. Fortunately! If there had been a city dome in the area, it would have been destroyed with enormous loss of life. Even so, I fear that there may be deaths that we shall never learn of. Miners, perhaps.”
“Sir,” I said, pointing at the briefcase, “those things. You didn’t find them there?”
He nodded somberly. “I did. But please bear with me, Jim. I was cruising over the sea floor, near the edge of the field of hot lava. I was making scientific observations—and also looking for survivors who might require my aid. My microsonar equipment had been half wrecked by the explosions, and of course the water was black with mud.
“All the same, I picked up a sonar distress signal.”
“My uncle?” I demanded. “Was it his signal?”
“I don’t know, Jim,” he said softly. “I recognized the signal at once as being from an automatic emergency transmitter. I was able to pinpoint it, and to follow it to its source, at the very edge of the lava flow.
“There was a wrecked sea-car there, half buried under boulders and mud.
“I signaled, but there was no answer. Since there was a chance of survivors, I got into edenite armor and went aboard the wreck.”
I gasped, “You did what?” But didn’t you know how dangerous it was?” I caught the Commandant’s eye on me and stopped; but that told me a lot about Father Tide. Know? Of course he had known; but it hadn’t stopped him.
He only said: “It was necessary. But I found no one. I believe the sea-car was struck by boulders thrown up in the eruption and disabled. The locks were open. All the scuba gear was gone.”
And that marked him as a true sea-man too, for no lubber would refer to Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus by its nickname, scuba.
“So the people in the car were able to get out?” I said hopefully.
He nodded. “Yes. But I am far from certain that they got away from the volcano.” He gestured at his briefcase. “I found those things in the sea-car. Then I had to leave—barely in time. I was almost trapped in another flow of volcanic mud.”
I started, “What—” Then I had to gulp and start again. “What do you think happened to my uncle?”
Father Tide’s blue eyes were cold and keen—surprisingly; for I would have expected them to be warm with sympathy.
“I was hoping you could tell me. Or at least—well, I was hoping that you would tell me that these things were not his property.”
“They are. But I can’t believe he was lost!”
“He’ll have my prayers,” Father Tide assured me. “Though perhaps he would not ask for them.”
He sighed, and looked out again over the bright blue sea. “Unfortunately,” he said, “being lost is not the most disturbing possibility for your uncle.”
I stared at him. “What are you talking about, sir?”
“I am accustomed to dealing with death,” he told me solemnly. “For that I feel well prepared. But this undersea volcano has presented me with other problems.” He paused, without saying what the problems were, while his blue eyes searched my face.
He asked suddenly: “Why was your uncle in the Indian Ocean?”
“I can’t say, sir. He was at home in Thetis Dome the last I knew.”
“How long ago?” he rapped out.
“Why—two months, it must have been.”
“And what was he doing there?”
“He was ill, Father Tide. I doubt that he was able to do much at all. He is in bad shape, and—”
“I see,” Father Tide interrupted. “In other words, he was desperate. Perhaps desperate enough to do—anything.”
“What are you suggesting?” I demanded.
For thirty seconds, the little priest looked at me sadly.
“This quake was not forecast,” he said at last. “There is evidence that it was—artificial.”
I sat staring, bewildered; he had lost me completely. “I don’t understand, sir,” I admitted.
“Only a trained seismologist can evaluate the evidence,” he said in his warm, clear voice, as though I were in a classroom. “I admit, also, that no point on the surface of the earth is entirely free from the danger of an unpredictable quake. Yet forecasting should give some indication. And this eruption is only one in a series of several—relatively minor, all located in uninhabited sections—which seem to follow a certain pattern.