Riptide by Douglas Preston, Lincoln Child Read Free Book Online

Hatch untied the
Plain Jane’s
dinghy and grabbed the starter.
    “Staying in town?” Neidelman asked as he stepped nimbly into the dinghy, taking a seat in the bow.
    Hatch shook his head as he started the engine. “I’ve booked a room in a motel in Southport, a few miles down the coast.” Even
     the boat rental had been done by an intermediary. He wasn’t ready yet to be recognized by anyone.
    Neidelman nodded, staring over Hatch’s shoulders toward land as they motored out to the boat. “Beautiful place,” he said,
     smoothly changing the subject.
    “Yes,” Hatch replied. “I suppose it is. There may be a few more summer homes, and there’s a bed-and-breakfast now, but otherwise
     the world has passed Stormhaven by.”
    “No doubt it’s too far north, off the beaten track.”
    “That’s part of it,” Hatch said. “But all the things that look so quaint and charming—the old wooden boats, the weather-beaten
     shacks, the crooked piers—are actually the result of poverty. I don’t think Stormhaven ever really recovered from the depression.”
    They came alongside the
Plain Jane.
Neidelman boarded the boat while Hatch tied the dinghy to the stern. He clambered aboard and was relieved to hear the diesel
     start up on the first crank with a nice, smooth rumble.
Might be old,
he thought as he eased out into the harbor,
but it’s well kept up.
As they cleared the no-wake zone, Hatch throttled up and the
Plain Jane
surged forward, slicing through the gentle swell. Overhead, the sun was struggling through the cloud cover, glowing in the
     remaining mist like a cold lamp. Hatch gazed southeastward, beyond Old Hump Channel, but could see nothing.
    “It’s going to be chilly out there,” he said, glancing at Neidelman’s short-sleeved shirt.
    Neidelman turned and smiled. “I’m used to it.”
    “You call yourself Captain,” Hatch said. “Were you in the navy?”
    “Yes,” came the measured response. “Captain of a minesweeper cruising off the Mekong Delta. After the war I bought a wooden
     dragger out of Nantucket and worked Georges Bank for scallops and flounder.” He squinted out to sea. “It was working that
     dragger that got me interested in treasure hunting.”
    “Really?” Hatch checked the compass and corrected course. He glanced at the engine hour meter. Ragged Island was six miles
     offshore; they’d be there in twenty minutes.
    Neidelman nodded. “One day the net brought up a huge bolus of encrusted coral. My mate struck it with a marlin spike, and
     the thing fell apart like an oyster. There, nestled inside, was a small, seventeenth-century Dutch silver casket. That started
     my first treasure hunt. I did a little digging through records and figured we must have dragged over the wreck site of the
Cinq Ports,
a barque commanded by the French privateer Charles Dampier. So I sold the boat, started a company, raised a million in capital,
     and went from there.”
    “How much did you recover?”
    Neidelman smiled slightly. “Just over ninety thousand in coins, china, and antiquities. It was a lesson I never forgot. If
     I’d bothered to do my research, I’d have looked up the manifests of the Dutch ships that Dampier attacked. They were mostly
     carrying lumber, coal, and rum.” He puffed his pipe meditatively. “Not all pirates were as skillful as Red Ned Ockham.”
    “You must have been as disappointed as the surgeon who hopes for a tumor and finds gallstones.”
    Neidelman glanced at him. “I guess you could say that.”
    Silence fell as they headed seaward. The last wisps of fog disappeared and Hatch could clearly make out the inner islands,
     Hermit and Wreck, green humps thickly covered with spruce trees. Soon, Ragged Island would become visible. He glanced at Neidelman,
     looking intently in the direction of the hidden island. It was time.
    “We’ve been chitchatting long enough,” he said quietly. “I want to hear about the man who designed the Water Pit.”
    Neidelman