“Edgar Watson? Isn’t he the one who was murdered? Every hurricane season people talk about that killing like it happened last week.”
“Yes. Shot on Chokoloskee by a crowd of neighbors, right after the Hurricane of 1910. Peter Matthiessen wrote several fascinating books about the time and the place, describing the Ten Thousand Islands as the last American frontier, full of outlaws and renegades forced to leave other states before the law caught up with them. I’ll get you one of Matthiessen’s books. I recommend Shadow Country. It’s eight hundred pages, but once you read it, you’ll know exactly what it was like to live in the Ten Thousand Islands a century ago.”
I nodded absently, my curiosity wrapped around Bucket Hat’s interest in the area, not a hundred-year-old murder. I asked Sally what she thought lured Bucket Hat to the library.
“The NOAA maps. He’d bring his own copies of NOAA maps and try to match them to the landmasses on our maps, which are, as you can see, ancient and may not be as accurate as today’s maps. The oldies have other gifts, like colloquial names, or markings of creeks or long-ago islands that don’t exist today.”
“You mentioned Noah before. What exactly . . . ?”
“Sorry, its shorthand for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA. You know, the hurricane guys.”
“Do they have maps indicating sunken ships?”
“Do they ever.” Sally bent over the map on the table, tucking a stray lock of hair under the arm of her eyeglasses. “All along here”—her hand fluttered up and down the Gulf west of the islands—“in fact, all around the coast of Florida, there are hundreds of sunken ships.”
I grinned. “A few hours ago I was telling some snowbirds about the pirates, the hurricanes and all the treasure ships. It wouldn’t surprise me to find them walking metal detectors on the beach after the next stormy day.”
“Mr. Selkirk isn’t interested in a few gold coins buried in the sand.” Sally brushed aside the metal detectors and brought us back to the maps. “He’s fascinated by the idea of finding a three- or four-hundred-year-old ship that’s bursting with gold and silver.”
She caught my eye to make sure she had my undivided attention. “The NOAA maps he brings with him are all from the wreck and obstruction system—you know, maps that indicate where wrecks and obstacles are situated on the Gulf floor. Could be any type. Maybe a decommissioned ship sunk to become an artificial reef. Maybe a ship that ran aground on a sandbar, or”—and here her eyes twinkled with delight—“maybe a treasure-laden Spanish galleon sunk by hurricanes or pirates.” She deepened her voice to a growl. “Aye, matey. Pirates.”
The adrenaline that rushed through me pushed my giggle shriller than it needed to be. But I was psyched. To me, his concentration on overlays of maps said Bucket Hat was playing for high stakes. And that could be dangerous for anyone in his way. My mind was reeling. Suppose there was an offshore shipwreck he wanted to explore and he was looking for a home base? If he suspected that Delia had clear title to islands in an area where the surrounding land is government owned and protected, how far would he go to get hold of her land?
While I signed the book so I could look at the maps, Sally scrambled through the drawers to find some modern print maps and copies of a few more hand-drawn studies, all charted in one decade or another during the last century. When I spread them on the table, I could see the nuance of difference in topography, especially the insignificant islands, some of which seemed to appear, disappear and then appear once again.
By the time Sally came back with Shadow Country and Killing Mister Watson, both written by Matthiessen, my head was about to explode with theories, most of which convicted Bucket Hat of murder. No jury, no trial, just me.
I piled my library books in the Heap-a-Jeep and headed to the turret, anxious to share my new information with Bridgy.