A young man with a convivial smile greeted them. “Can I help you gentlemen with anything?”
“I hope so. My name’s Sam Reilly and this is Tom Bower. We’re looking for a friend who came up here to do some diving recently. We’re kind of hoping you might have seen him around here and better yet, have some idea where he’s headed.”
“Sure. Who’s your friend?”
“David Perry.”
The dive operator’s lips curled into a broad grin. “Senator Perry’s kid?”
Sam matched his smile. “That’d be the one. Have you seen him?”
“Sure have. He was in here… gosh… let me think, a little over three weeks ago. He filled up some tanks with Trimix and straight Oxygen. He likes to use a rebreather. Increases his bottom time, although how long he could possibly want to stay down in Lake Superior, beats me.”
Sam took the hook. “Did he say where he was headed?”
“No.”
“Did he come in here often?”
“Sure did. He dived pretty much every day for about a month through Summer.”
Sam’s eyes narrowed. “Did he mention what he was looking for?”
“No. But it was pretty obvious. He was after treasure — even offered to hire someone to help him go searching for a wrecked seaplane.”
“Did you?”
“Did we, what?”
“Help find the wrecked seaplane?”
“No. In the end, he didn’t have the faintest idea where to look.” The diver made a wry smile, like the kid was an idiot. “Fact was, he was a rich kid out on a treasure hunt with no knowledge and no experience for how to find what he was after.”
“Right…” Sam was starting to get the picture. “Did he mention where he was headed three weeks ago?”
“No.” The diver paled. “Do you think he’s all right? He was just some dumb rich kid, but he was a good man.”
“I don’t know. That’s what we’re here to find out.” Sam wrote his cell phone number on a dive pad and left it with the man. “If David happens to stop in or anyone you know sees him, can you please give me a call?”
“Yes, of course.”
“What was your name?” Sam asked.
The diver offered his hand, “Mark Smith.”
Sam took it, glancing at the Rolex on the man’s wrist. “Thank you for your time, Mark Smith.”
They were about to leave, when Tom asked, “Have you ever dived the J.F. Johnson?”
“No. Never. It’s not really the sort of dive tourists like to be taken.”
“Why’s that?” Tom asked.
“For starters it’s a very deep, cold, technical dive. But more importantly, it’s considered bad taste to visit. Four men lost their lives when she went down back in 1931. Those who have dived her, report seeing the four men still at their positions keeping spectral watch from the wheelhouse. No, my recommendation to anyone interested in diving her, is to leave those men to rest in peace.”
Tom lowered his head, respectfully. “Of course, that sounds reasonable. I only ask because I’d heard David mention it a few times over the years, so I wondered if he may have dived it.”
“He could have.” Mark sighed. “And if he did, it’s very likely it might have cost him his life. It’s a difficult dive and extremely dangerous. I wouldn’t recommend diving it.”
Sam ended the conversation, before Tom could continue it any further. “We’ll take that into consideration. Thanks again for your help.”
Thirty seconds later, Sam and Tom stepped out of the dive shop and started walking back to the Annabelle May.
Sam said, “Anything seem odd about that?”
“Anything not seem strange?” Tom blinked. “Yeah, what’s a local dive operator charging less than a hundred dollars a dive running a multi-million-dollar Beneteau as a dive yacht?”
“Exactly.”
Sam walked a few more paces and then grinned. “I don’t believe it.”
“What?”
“It’s been staring at us in the face all this time.”
“What?”
“Don’t you see. The expensive boat, European cars, the Rolex watch… the tourist dive boat is shipping contraband.”
“On board the J.F. Johnson?”
“No. But something inside it betrays their secret involvement.” Sam paused for a moment and then grinned. “And Senator Perry knows about it.”
A wry smile formed on Tom’s lips as he thought about that. “Sure, that fits. But how are you going to prove a thing like that?”
“I don’t have to. Just watch this.”
Tom had a bemused smile on his face. “Okay, I’ll bite.”
Sam turned around and walked back into the dive shop.
Mark, the dive operator greeted him. “What did you forget?”
“One more thing I just remembered I meant to ask you about.” Sam’s voice was intentionally soft, timid, almost meek. “Do you have time?”
The dive operator nodded. “Shoot.”
Sam’s lips formed a coy smile of indifference, but his eyes focused on the dive operator’s face, waiting for a reaction. “When David Perry — Senator Perry’s son — dived the wheelhouse of the J.F. Johnson a little over three weeks ago, he wrote his father, telling him he’d found some sort of irrefutable evidence regarding the location of the Meskwaki Gold Spring.”
“Okay…” the dive operator said, noncommittally.
“Any idea what that could have been referring to?”
“No, not a clue.”
Sam took a deep breath, holding it for just a moment and then made a theatrical sigh. “We’re thinking about diving the J.F. Johnson tomorrow morning, see what we can find. Do you want to join us?”
Mark’s eyes widened and he visibly took a deep breath. “I’m afraid we already have clients booked to dive the Lafayette tomorrow. But please, let us know how you do.”
“Okay, great, we will — and if you think of anything, let us know.”
“Of course.” If there was still any doubt about his involvement, the dive operator squashed it when he then lied. “By the way, I’ve never even heard of the Meskwaki Gold Spring.”
Chapter Eight
It was a little after nine p.m. and a thick fog seemed to penetrate and obscure everything. Tom kept his eyes fixed on the radar, without which, he doubted anyone could have navigated the frigid waters of Lake Superior — a testament to the six thousand or more shipwrecks that rested on the lake’s seabed.
After laying the trap, he knew it was only a matter of time before Mark — the dive operator — or someone else from the dive company would head out to the wreck site of the J.F. Johnson. If they were involved in illegal shipping of contraband and they thought Sam and Tom’s dive tomorrow might reveal irrefutable evidence to such effect, they would dive the wheelhouse tonight to remove it.
At ten minutes past nine p.m. the outline of the Superior Deep, the luxurious motor yacht built by Beneteau and used as a diving charter boat, came into view. On the radar, Tom watched as the vessel, with its sleek lines, crept out along the channel and into the deep and open waters of Lake Superior.
Sam glanced at Tom, who was at the wheel of the Annabelle May. “You see it?”
Tom relaxed into the Napa leather seat, with his legs casually up against the instrument panel, he nodded. “I see it. I’m going to let them have some space before I follow.”
“Don’t lose them.”
Tom lowered his feet, eased the twin throttles gently forward. “Why the rush? We know where they’re headed.”
It was nearly two hours before they rounded the southern end of Isle Royale, headed north and reached the wreck site of the J.F. Johnson.