Just Needs Killin' (Hetta Coffey Series, Book 6) Page 11

  Fabio looked to Chino for support, but only got a helpless shrug. After a thirty-minute wrangle, we agreed on a compromise. The wine would be stored on Fabio's extra bunk, and he'd issue a couple of bottles for dinner each night. Jan and I asked what the others were going to drink, but only received a glower.

  Luckily, Jan and I had already stashed two cases in an empty cabin next to mine before taking the rest to the galley.

  Oh, and I had a key to Fabio's cabin.

  Don't mess with Texas.

  Or their wine.

  Surprisingly enough, Fabio named me First Mate.

  I was flattered until I learned he did so because no one else on board knew how to operate a large vessel, or were as familiar as I was with most of the operating systems. And when I Googled a First Mate's duties, I found my job less than glamorous, except the part where I keep the ship off the rocks when the captain ups and dies. It turns out I was not at all qualified as a real First Mate, as that requires a real license. When I pointed this out to Fabio, he shrugged and told me he intended to run a fairly loose ship, and who better to do that than me?

  Doncha just hate it when someone learns sarcasm from the master, and then turns it on her?

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  With provisions on board, the crew settled in, and most of our equipment either on the way or being installed, it was time to turn my attention to my main mission for the summer: Get Dickless.

  One of the best things about living amongst so many of Chino's relatives is their penchant for nosiness. It is a trait I value, being a natural born snoop myself. In this part of the Baja, if you want to keep track of someone, this respected family is a primary source of info. And to make matters even better, Dickless's nefarious ways had put the family in direct conflict with him a time or two, including his involvement in having their favorite marine biologist, Chino, tossed into the slammer. The family doesn't have a lot of money or political clout, which is probably the only reason Lujàn never actually tried to steal anything from them. What they do have is connections.

  I started the search for Dickless with Grandmother Yee, or Abuela Yee, as the family calls her. Jan and I had somewhat rescued her from an iffy situation earlier in the year, so she was my new best friend. Jan, she had doubts about. She liked her, but wasn't sure Jan was right for her darling, Chino. I heartily agreed, for Chino's sake.

  Abuela tossed a stone into her far-reaching gossip pool and got a ripple. She imparted her news when I stopped in for a visit at her home in Lopez Mateos, and I couldn't decide whether it was good or bad news.

  "He's here?" Jan squawked when I told her what Grans Yee learned. We were in my cabin, polishing off a bottle of wine after dinner. Po Thang lounged on the top bunk, a place I thought impossible for him to get to until I stashed a bag of Fritos there earlier in the day. He was sawing logs and sharing loud, corn-scented snores with us.

  "Not here, here. His ticket's been punched in Mag Bay. But she told me the vegetable guy told her that the tamale woman's aunt's cousin rented him a house in Constitución."

  "Which is practically next door."

  "Yep. Ain't that grand? Now we can off him at will."

  "Oh, sure, Sherlock. We do him in, and before the body cools the tamale woman's aunt's cousin will tell the police Granny Yee was looking for him, and then they will come looking for you, because you two have history, and Chino's cop cousin knows it. You'll be convicted of murder and I'll be stuck down here for the rest of my natural life in order to make sure you get proper food and medicine."

  "That should make Chino happy, at least. Crap, why can't you just be the dumb blonde you resemble? And why do I go to prison alone? You're in this up to your shapely eyebrows. By the way, I've been meaning to ask you if you had those done around here."

  "Eyebrow gal in town, but it's hard to get in; it's that Frida Kahlo thing with Mexican women. And, Hetta, one of us has to stay out of jail to feed the other."

  "I'm feeling all warm and fuzzy here."

  "It's those eyebrows. I'll get you an appointment."

  Jan was annoyingly right, my eyebrows were bushy, and terminating Lujàn outright was out of the question unless I could pull off a drive-by shooting, which would be difficult without a gun.

  We had to hire someone.

  Someone in low places.

  Someone who kills people all the time.

  Someone like…Nacho.

  Who was not returning my calls.

  I put Dickless on the back burner for now, because first things first: We had sunken treasure to unearth.

  Our first tactical meeting was held in the dining/computer/movie room, with all hands in attendance.

  Chino greeted each member of the team, gave their title and a summation of duties, then said, "As you all know, we are looking for the Manila galleon San Carlos, known to have sailed from the Philippines near the end of the 1590's, bound for Acapulco. I said known only because of my family's historical account, because there is no actual record of this ship in the Spanish archives."

  That was news to me, and by the looks on the others' faces, to them.

  I was the first to verbalize our shock. "Say what? I thought the Spaniards were meticulous record keepers. They sure as hell recorded deporting my family from Spanish Texas in 1811."

  Everyone except the Japanese guys laughed. They just look confused, but the laughter lightened the up-until-then somewhat tense atmosphere.

  Still grinning, Chino quipped, "For circumventing the King's tax system, no doubt. Actually, that is exactly what happened during the galleon trade era. Before 1600, ships sailed with fake or no manifest, but were loaded with merchandise belonging to rich merchants who did not care to share their wealth with Spain's tax collectors. This ship could have been one of those. Like I said, the only way we know about San Carlos is through a family historical account passed down through the generations."

  "So how did you get a permit to search for it?" Fabio asked. I suppose the last thing he wanted was being chief officer on an illicit treasure hunt. His license was at stake.

  "Fabio, you were there when the evidence surfaced. The astrolabe we dredged up with Hetta's anchor last year. After testing, the Mexican National Institute of Anthropology and History experts feel it is from a galleon, and that allowed the permit."

  "And," I added, "Hetta is still waiting for her payoff for said astrolabe."

  "Which brings me to another point everyone on this ship should be aware of. There is no payoff. Everything we find belongs to the Mexican government."

  "What if Spain wants it?" Jan asked. "I've read lately the Spaniards got a bunch of gold brought up by a British salver because it was from a sunken Spanish ship."

  Chino shook his head. "Only because that was a ship sunk by the British in an act of war. No, Spain would play bloody hell getting an international court to award them plundered Mexican gold and silver, even if it is in the form of Spanish coinage. Or jewelry fashioned in the Far East for Spanish royalty.

  "And bye the bye," Chino added, dredging up the Queen's English left over from his days at University there, "chances of finding much gold are slim. These merchant galleons bound for Acapulco were sometimes carrying as much as two and a half million pesos in treasure, but that described the entire cargo, because a peso wasn't a coin, but a monetary unit equaling one and an eighth ounce troy of silver. In other words, that was what would be called insurance value these days."

  "I guess finding a piece of the galleon is out of the question, right?" Fabio asked.

  "Four hundred years in salt water? Not a chance the wood could survive, although there was one instance, in Sweden, where a sunken vessel was found almost intact after almost as long."

  I waved my hand in the air in a 'Me! Me!' gesture. Chino nodded. "Let me guess, Hetta, you have something to add?"

  "I have visited the Wasa museum in Stockholm, and the only reason that ship was so well-preserved was it sank into heavily polluted, highly toxic water. The little bugge
rs that eat wood and break it down couldn't live."

  "Very good. You are simply a font of trivial knowledge. Point well taken. I doubt a sliver of wood still exists, but we'll be dragging a magnetometer and, with any luck, the San Carlos's cannons were not bronze, as it will only detect ferrous metals."

  "Like cannon balls?" Jan asked.

  "Does anyone at all besides Fabio, Hetta and Jan have anything to say?"

  Chino's cousin, the deckhand, spoke up. "The bay is not so large, and not so deep. Why have we never found this ship?"

  "Very good question, and I have a theory. We know bits of pottery have been found on the beaches for years, and then there is our astrolabe. I think maybe everything is covered in tons of sand and silt. We have had many storms in four hundred years, and the bottom has shifted. For all we know, the artifacts could be under one of the dunes." He pointed to the high sand dunes nearby.

  "Clive Cussler. Sahara," I said, referring to the book about a submarine buried in the desert.

  "Fiction. But based on a like-theory. Anyway, our job is really to mark any promising sites for later exploration by someone allowed to vacuum up the bottom. Our permit only allows diving, detecting and recording. Unless, of course, we find visible artifacts, and then I will call in the Mexican Ministry."

  That pretty much put a damper on the meeting. It looked as though we were all in for a long, tedious, boring summer with little to show for it. Sensing our gloom, Chino said, with a twinkle in his eye, "But then again, if we find a bronze cannon from this period, and it is well-decorated and preserved, it will be worth at least thirty-or-forty-thousand dollars, and there might be as many as twenty-five or thirty of them."

  There was a moment of silence as we all tried to do the mental math. Chino, reading our minds, grinned. "Over a million dollars, U.S. I said earlier there was no payback in order, but the truth is, we are entitled to a ten percent finders fee for non-gold and silver items. Divided by we nine, it could come to at least ten thousand each. Not bad for a few month's work."

  The Japanese men finally smiled.

  "Uh, that's divided by ten," I said.

  Everyone looked at me. "Ship's dog: Po Thang."

  Later in our cabin I told Po Thang, "Hey, buddy, I tried to get you your share, but only got soundly booed for my efforts."

  Po Thang whined and curled up on the top bunk. Someday I was going to catch him getting up there, but for now I had no idea how he did it.

  I made a note to order an animal cam.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Still no word on Ishikawa, dead or alive.

  Nacho would not return my calls.

  I went into Constitución and drove by the address I was given for Dickless, but the place looked deserted. How was I gonna punch his lights if he wouldn't stay home?

  Meanwhile, I was working my butt off. Considering the fact that I was not being paid, I began to rethink this treasure hunt thing. I mentioned this to Jan and she reminded me I was staying rent free, meals provided, and had a chance to get a share of a possible cannon find. "Think of it as a kind of summer sea camp. Besides, Hetta, what else you got to do all summer?"

  "Besides doing in Dickless?"

  "How we gonna do that, by the way?"

  "I was kinda hoping Nacho would take care of him."

  "And how is that working out for you?" she sneered.

  "Not well at all, Doctor Phil. He won't call me back."

  "And you find this unusual in a man? Might have something to do with you giving me his number when he told you, in no uncertain terms, not to give it to anybody."

  "It was an emergency. Beside you aren't anybody."

  "Thanks."

  "You know what I mean. He knows you. I guess I really pissed him off, huh?"

  "It was only a matter of time."

  "I don't piss off everyone I meet."

  "Name one."

  "Well, uh, you?"

  "Don't even go there."

  "Okay, okay, point made. So, any ideas on how to do the dirty deed?"

  "You're asking me? Hell, you're the one determined to plant the bastard. I'm in, but don't count on me to come up with some idiotic plan. That's your job."

  "Remember The Equalizer?"

  "The one with Denzel Washington? Haven't seen it yet."

  "No, the old television show, with that British guy." I stood and rasped, "Got a problem? Odds against you? Call The Equalizer."

  "Robert McCall! I loved that show. We could sure use him."

  In my best British accent, I said, "I can equalize the odds."

  "He was wonderful. But, he wasn't real. I agree with you that Nacho is our best bet."

  I smiled. "In a criminal kind of way."

  "And speaking of, I was thinking about that dognapping thing. Doesn't it seem odd that when I called Nacho to ask him for help, he said he was very, and I do mean very, upset that you'd given out his number. But the next thing we know, he gives you a call. And it seems he was responsible for springing Lil."

  "I'll never forgive him."

  "What exactly did he say when he called that day?"

  "Look out your door."

  Jan swiveled in her chair and craned her neck. "What?"

  "No, dummy. That's what he said."

  "Aha! He knew the panga was there, and he was letting you know he knew. He was taking credit!"

  "I've never thought otherwise. And if he'd ever return my calls, I'd thank him. Oh, and try to hire him to erase Luján's smarmy face from this universe for us."

  She laughed. "Did you ever consider that maybe he was somehow involved before I called him?"

  "How could that be? Surely he didn't have a hand in nabbing Po Thang? Although, those two have had their moments. Nope, you told him about Lil and my dog, and he fixed it."

  "That's just it. I didn't."

  "What do you mean?"

  "All I said was someone took your dog, and he hung up. Next thing we know, dog and aunt show up, and we know for sure he had something to do with that part."

  "Which means he knew about the pictures I took?" I sipped wine until Jan flapped her hands impatiently at me. "Just hold ye hardy, mate. I'm concentrating here. Trying to remember how it all went down that day. Okay, first off, I had some kind of nervous fit, and went totally bonkers."

  "Nothing new there."

  "No, really, really nuts. I mean Jack Nicholson apeshit. I was screaming like a madwoman—" Jan started to make what was no doubt some smart remark, but I stabbed a warning finger in her direction, "and then suddenly went deadly calm. Waving the camera in front of the webcam, I threatened to share those photos of Ishikawa's body, and Lujan and his goons loading what looked like a stiff into his Navigator, onto my Facebook page. And with every newspaper in the world, if I didn't get my dog back that very day."

  "And by some miracle, Nacho, who was not at all involved in any of that resort debacle, calls just a few hours from your deadline, and tells you to look outside where, by some miracle of presto chango, there's Po Thang, all safe and sound? Okay, we are way beyond coincidence here."

  "Watson, methinks Nacho has some 'splainin' to do."

  "Good luck with that, the man has written you off. Not the first time that's happened."

  My satellite communications system made life so much easier on the research vessel Nao de Chino.

  Not only did we have high speed Internet, and phone service, we also received television channels from all over the world. The problem was getting everyone on our little ship of Babel to agree on a program. The official ship's language was English, with a smattering of Spanish and Japanese thrown in for confusion.

  Fabio, Rosa, and the other two Mexican crew were addicted to Mexican telenovellas, Chino and Po Thang quite naturally loved Animal Planet, Jan and I stuck with the Turner Movie Classics, and the two Japanese grad students were out of luck, as we didn't pick up anything from Japan. They took it with good cheer, saying they wanted to improve their English and learn Spanish.

  I
n a small shop in Puerto San Carlos, I found a DVD of Tora! Tora! Tora! with Spanish and Japanese subtitles. We all watched it together. I knew enough Japanese to know that tora meant tiger, but the two students explained it was also the code name of the attack on Pearl Harbor. They also commented, as young people do sometimes when looking back on history from a safe distance, that the entire war was a disaster for Japan, but they staunchly defended the bravery of the men who died.

  "Did you lose any relatives?" Jan asked.

  Both gave a curt nod, a bow, and left for their quarters, leaving us a little embarrassed and somewhat confused, because they seemed to enjoy the movie.

  Jan stared at their backs as they left. "Umm, ya think maybe next week we need a comedy?"

  "Okay, how about La Cage aux Folles? I saw the DVD in town."

  "French or American version?"

  "Both, if I can get them. La Cage marathon night."

  "Ya know, the Mexican crew might not appreciate a gay movie."

  "Too bad. From now on I'll get something to guarantee someone gets annoyed."

  "What will annoy us?"

  "Love Story. Ali MacGraw was so annoying I couldn't wait for her to die."

  "And people say you are no sentimentalist."

  After two weeks of intense labor by the entire crew, Nao de Chino was finally ready to start the search for our galleon, or rather what the wreck left behind. Because Magdalena Bay is only a little over thirty miles long, and has many shoals, skeptics said there was no way any treasure could have escaped discovery all of these years, but Chino remained optimistic.

  Between shopping online for expedition materials and equipment, getting it all shipped via whatever method available, and then dealing with Mexican customs, the time flew by. I talked with Jenks on Skype when I was on the ship, but there were days when I was on the road, and then he called me on my Mexican cell. I didn't have time to worry about Ishikawa, or keep tabs on Lujàn. A mistake, I learned, when I stopped at the marina in Santa Rosalia after one of my copper mine meetings, to pick up a package flown in from Monterrey on Aero Calafia.