We paid the bill and walked down the hill to the docks. The Castine marina sat on Water Street, just past Dennett’s Wharf, a restaurant that proclaimed it had an amazing oyster bar. I made a mental note to check it out if we got the chance.

  Dock Three was easy enough to find. And so was the Vector. Painted white with bright orange trim, she was maybe twenty-feet long, with a single sail and an outboard motor. Dave Chandler wore an Aussie bush hat, a long beard that was streaked with white, and had more lines on his face than a speech by Cicero.

  “‘Mornin!” he said by way of greeting as we walked up. “You the folks Sandy called me about, wanting to take in some of the Bay?”

  I resisted the urge to glance at Charade. I had to remind myself that Castine was a small town and of course, the waitress had probably called him ahead of time. Still, the spy part of me couldn’t put it all down to just small town policy.

  “We are,” I said. “How much to check out some of the islands around the Bay?”

  Chandler shrugged. “Depends on the sea and how she likes us. But for a half day charter, maybe two hundred.”

  I nodded. “That’s fine. How close can you get the islands?”

  Chandler reached up under his hat and gave his skull a ferocious scratching. “Well, I can put you on the shore of some of them and pretty darned close to others. But some of them are private, so if you want to be sneaking ashore, you’d best do it when I’m not looking.” He cackled a bit and then waved us aboard. “Not to worry, I’ll make sure you have the trip of your lives. Let’s get going, though. Unless either of you needs to use the toilet before we shove off.”

  “We’re good,” I said. I sat on the starboard side and Charade took port. Chandler untied his ropes and cranked up the outboard. The boat eased away from the dock and soon thereafter, we were riding swells as he took us out into the Bay.

  The sun continued to ascend and burned off the last of the clouds as it did so. A breeze blew up and Chandler grunted. “Now there’s a fine gust. No sense burning gas when Mother Nature has seen fit to gift us with some of her finest breath.”

  He hoisted the sail and instantly, the sheet billowed and went taut. The boat lifted on the starboard side, putting Charade closer to the water. I thought she might want to switch places, but she laughed as she caught some of the ocean spray.

  Chandler eased the sheet just a bit and we settled back for a steady churn through the water, our bow slicing through the waves, dipping and rising as we rode the crests. I could feel the warmth of the sun on my face and and cold spray. The day was turning out to be magnificent.

  Chandler pointed out some of the smaller islands as we passed them. “Hightide Island right there, because you can only just see it right now. That’s why they’ve got her marked like they do. Don’t want anyone running their ship into her.”

  I noticed that Charade had the compass out and kept discretely checking it while Chandler was his running commentary.

  We circled Hightide Island and then headed east. Charade sat with me now as Chandler directed us to help equalize the weight in the boat. We tacked again, and he brought us toward a slightly larger island. “That’s Hospital Island. But there ain’t never been a hospital on it.” He chuckled to himself, probably remembering some salty joke that others from the area would appreciate, but that would no doubt be lost on me and Charade.

  “That there’s Great Island and beyond over there is Gray’s. But Gray’s ain’t much of an island seeing as she’s connected to the peninsula. But they call it an island, so what the hell, right?”

  Charade nudged me and pointed southwest. I could see another island off of my eleven o’clock. A long dock stretched out into the Bay and I noticed it had a boathouse and beyond, a large yellow home overlooking the waters.

  “Which one is that?”

  “That’d be Nautilus,” said Chandler. “Only got sold in the last few years to the people who own Dennett’s back in town. I watched that island drop in price from ten million to seven to five to three and finally got her sold at one million and change. Absolute steal. It’s a gorgeous place. Thirty some odd acres, couple homes, even a vineyard if you can believe that.” He nudged me. “It’s available for renting for weddings and the like, if you get my drift.” Then he laughed and steered us toward the coast of the island.

  “So no one lives on it full-time?”

  Chandler shrugged. “Oh sure, there’s a caretaker. But he’s got himself a place on the backside of the island. No one lives in the main house. But it’s a beauty.”

  “Why did it sell for such a low price?” asked Charade.

  Chandler shrugged. “Well, now, that’s the big question. You ask regular folks, they’ll tell you that the financial industry collapse had a little something to do with it. Seems like most folks weren’t interested in owning an island.”

  I eyed him. “And what about if you ask folks like you? Castine folks.”

  He swept his eyes on to mine. “Folks like me you say?” His jovial smile slipped and I saw something creep into his eyes that I knew only too well. Fear.

  “Yeah.”

  Chandler looked out across the bow. “Used to be a legend around the place. Before they developed it. Time was, they said, you used to hear the most unnatural sounds coming out of that place. Late at night. Howls, screams, grunting. Unearthly type stuff. Don’t reckon anyone could figure it out. And then one day after it had been sold, it just stopped. And everything seemed pretty okay.”

  “You ever see anything weird when you’ve been out on the water?”

  Chandler’s grin returned. “You stay out on the water long enough, you see some pretty weird things. I once saw a giant great white shark take a seal just off Holbrook Island, but no one believed me. Too far north, too cold water for ‘em, but I know what I saw and I’ll never forget watching the ocean turn bright frothy red. That seal screamed like a human, too. Damned sight of it, I’ll tell you that. Never forget it.” His voice trailed off.

  Chandler steered us closer to the island. As we approached, I could see the main house. It didn’t look as old as I thought it might. No more than twenty years. I saw an infinity pool, an outdoor eating area, and more smaller houses as we circumvented it.

  Chandler lowered his voice as we drifted through the shallows on the back side. “One time, I was coming back from fishing off of Holbrook. The sun, she’d already gone to sleep. And there was an inky sky that night. No stars, no moon. Not a whole lot to see by. I should have already been back in town having a whiskey. But I’d stayed because the fishing was so good and I was pulling them in like no one’s business. Had enough for a month, easy, which to you and me means a big savings on food expenditures.”

  “Go on.”

  He trimmed the sheet a bit as if wanting to hasten our departure. I glanced at Charade and she nodded at me and then to the compass. We were close.

  “I came abreast of this island and I swear to you, that through the trees that line that part right up ahead there,” he pointed and I followed his gaze. The shore fell away from a cliff of solid stone and atop the cliff were stands of thick pine.

  “Red eyes,” Chandler said simply.

  “Red eyes?”

  He nodded. “I’m no forest man. I can’t set traps or make a fire worth a damn. I’m born to the sea. That’s where I make my bones. But I can tell you this, I ain’t never seen red eyes like what I saw that night. They just sat there, unblinking. Scores of them. Like they were all lined up watching me as I come past the island.”

  “Just the eyes?”

  “I wish,” said Chandler. “As I drew closer, it seemed like the current got stronger, like the water was taking me to the eyes themselves. Trying to run me aground or something, I don’t know. But as I fought to keep on my heading, I could hear them breathing. Raspy, awful sounds.” He shook his head. “I had a thought then, but I don’t know if it was for real or just me being ridiculous.”

  “What thought was that?” asked Charade.

  “That those eyes were bending the water to their will. Like they could control the ocean and bring me to them if that was what they wanted.” He smirked. “I know, it sounds like the ravings of an old drunk.”

  “Can’t help what you feel sometimes,” I said. “And you’ve got enough experience on the water to know when something feels unnatural.”

  Chandler pointed at me. “That’s it. That’s what it felt like. Unnatural. Like even the sea didn’t want to cooperate but she had no choice.”

  “How close did you get?” asked Charade again.

  “Close enough to know that if I’d gone into the water, or worse, on to that island, no one would have ever heard from me again.” He shivered for a moment. “Beautiful place, no doubt. But you’d never catch me going on there. And that’s the damned truth.”

  “Anyone ever go missing around here?”

  Chandler stared at me again. “What did you say you did for a living, mister?”

  “I didn’t,” I said. “But I sometimes write stories. And I have a particular affection for tales of old New England. This is my home, after all.”

  “This isn’t your home,” said Chandler. “You’re a Boston guy. Big difference between your city and the likes of Downeast Maine.”

  “Granted,” I said. “But we’re all New Englanders.”

  “Maybe.” Chandler brought us away from Nautilus and his mood seemed to brighten as soon as he did so. “You ask if anyone’s ever gone missing? Yeah, we’ve had some disappear over the years. That’s not anything unusual, though. Got the Maritime kids who sometimes get drunk and take a skiff out, lose their way, fall overboard and then we have to scour the area for the bodies. Usually only takes a day or two to find them.”

  “I’m not talking about Maritime kids getting wasted and sailing. I’m talking about people who you wouldn’t expect to go missing, but do. Castine folks.”

  Chandler frowned and I didn’t know if I was maybe pushing things too far. But I felt like I had to know. After all, we were going to be coming back here tonight. And if there were any surprises, I wanted to know all about them.

  “Yeah, we’ve had some of those,” said Chandler. “Good friend of mine went missing about ten years back. Never been another man who knew the sea as well as he did. He’d been through it all, and not just in these waters, either. He’d sailed the Bering Sea on a crabber during one of the worst storms ever, been tossed into the drink when the boat went down and waited almost twelve hours for the Coast Guard to finally pluck him out, nearly turned into ice.”

  “Jesus.”

  Chandler nodded. “He knew the Bay better than most men know their own house. Every pitfall, every drop off. Every square inch of it. And he went missing just like that without any sort of storm or gale or fault. He went out one day and just never came back. They never found him. Never found his boat. And we tried. Even after they officially called off the search, I kept looking. Did for him what I’d want someone to do for me. And I couldn’t find a single splinter of his boat. If he went down, then something took that boat and scattered it to the seven seas.”

  I looked out across the Bay and then back at Nautilus Island. Maybe Charade and I would find the answers tonight when we crept ashore.

  I just hoped we didn’t find more than we could handle.

  13

  As nice as the day had been, by the time we got back to the marina, thick clouds had slithered in from the west, all but obscuring the sun. Chandler glanced up as we motored back in and grumbled to himself.

  “Where’d that come from? There was nothing in the weather forecast about a storm.”

  I looked at Charade but she studied the sky instead of looking back at me. We thanked Chandler for his help and then wandered away from the docks. I wanted to put space between us before we started talking again.

  I felt the first drops of rain a moment later. “Damn.”

  Charade shook her head. “This isn’t a natural storm. Someone is moving the elements into the area to impede our progress.”

  “Are you sure?”

  She nodded. “It feels wrong. Given the wonderful day we had out on the Bay, this is completely weird. I can sense when magical machinations are afoot and they are definitely so.” She looked at me. “If I had to guess, I’d say that our enemies know that we’re here and will be mobilizing against us.”

  I stopped and looked back out in the Bay and at Nautilus Island. “We can’t just head out there now, as much as I wish we could. Someone would spot us. And I don’t want to run into any sort of welcome party if you catch my drift.”

  “I agree,” said Charade. “But the longer we wait, the more time we give our foes to marshall their forces against us. And I don’t know about you but when we passed that island, I definitely felt the presence of something.”

  “The old man’s story didn’t help, either,” I said. “That was pretty creepy.”

  Charade nodded. “I have some ideas about what might be lurking out there, but we won’t know until we get onto the island itself.”

  “But you’re certain the item we need is there?”

  “According to Thorssen’s compass it is,” said Charade. “That’s about the best we can hope for right now.”

  I checked my watch. We’d been out for most of the morning and I needed food. “We need a place to lie down for a few hours before we go out. I don’t think we can take the chance of trying to insert now. It’s just too risky. Plus, we’d need to steal a boat in order to get out there.”

  Charade frowned. “I hate the idea of waiting.”

  “Can you fly us out there?”

  She eyed me. “Are you trying to be funny?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I mean, I said it in jest, but as soon as I did so, I thought you might know how to fly, so take it however you want.”

  She stayed serious for another second and then broke into a grin. “I wish I could. But I’d also have to make us invisible. Can you imagine the uproar if people saw us floating across the Bay?”

  “They’d be talking about it for weeks.”

  “Years.”

  “True.” I looked up Main Street and pointed. “There’s some sort of inn up there. Maybe we can get a room for the night.”

  As we walked, Charade tucked her arm in mine. “You certainly know how to show a girl a good time.”

  “Me?” I shook my head. “This is all you, sweetheart. I’m just a bystander in all of this craziness.”

  “You have more of a part to play than you know,” said Charade. “Your destiny is so much more than just the retrieval of this item. In time, you’ll come to understand it.”

  “Why don’t you just tell me now?”

  But she only shook her head. “It’s not my place to do so. And I’m not even sure I have all of the correct information. I would hate to tell you something that later turned out to be false. Just know that there’s more to this than you think.”

  “Well, I know the fate of humanity could be at stake, so in that way, it’s a little bit like being back at work with the CIA.”

  Charade smiled. “I’m sure our future will quickly convince you otherwise.”

  We stopped in front of an old beautiful home. A smart sign hung on a hinge that blew in the wind now. “Pentagoet Inn and Restaurant.” I shrugged. “Seems nice enough. Let’s check it out.”

  We walked into the main lobby and were greeted immediately by a man about fifteen years my senior with a ponytail and beard. “Welcome.”

  “Looking for a room for the night,” I said. “Any vacancy?”

  He didn’t reply. Instead, he just looked at me. Finally, he seemed to remember himself and looked back down at his book. “One room? Yes, yes...absolutely. Just sign in here and we get you sorted.”

  As I signed in, Charade paid for the room. The innkeeper seemed unsure of himself again and then nodded at me. “I’ll need some identification from you, too, sir.”

  “Sure.” I fished out my license and handed it over. He disappeared into the back office.

  Charade nudged me. “He seems a bit...odd.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I wasn’t sure what was going on there.”

  “He’s definitely interested in you.”

  “What-romantically? I don’t think so.”

  Charade shook her head. “No, silly, he’s interested in you. Like he knows you from somewhere. Have you ever seen him before?”

  “I mean, I could have. I don’t know. That ponytail and beard would probably help me remember him, but I’m drawing a blank.”

  “You can grow both of those within a short period of time,” said Charade. “Try to imagine what he’d look like without them.”

  “Easier said than done, but we’ll see when he comes back.”

  As if on cue, the man returned and handed me back my license. “Always good to see a fellow philatelist.”

  For a moment, I stood there frozen. Then my reflexes kicked in and I smiled. “I wondered if we’d met before. Columbus, wasn’t it?”

  “Des Moines, actually,” said the older man. “But after all these years, what does it matter?”

  “Indeed.” I stuck my hand out. “Rick. Good to see you again.”

  “Harry.” His grip was rock solid. He might have looked like a bit of a hippie refugee, but when he spoke the recognition code, I knew instantly what he was: another spook.

  “This is Charade,” I said then.

  Harry took her hand in his and smiled warmly. “It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Miss.”

  Charade bowed her head. “So charming. You have the most interesting friends, Rick.”

  “Sometimes I don’t even know how charming they are,” I said with a grin.

  “You know,” said Harry, “I can get my wife to show Charade your room. How about a drink for old time’s sake? I’ve got a pub right off the main lobby here.”

  I looked at Charade but she only smiled. “That will be fine.”

  I looked back at Harry. “Good enough. But it’s a bit early for a drink, isn’t it?”

  He chuckled. “It’s five o’clock somewhere.”

 

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