The Treasure Coast officially stops at the Palm Beach County line, where the Gold Coast begins with Tequesta and the surrounding communities. But hurricanes don’t take their orders from the chamber of commerce.
A highly professional salvage crew began faithfully showing up at the same spot offshore for two weeks. The descriptions in their claim were deliberately downplayed: just exploring for scant artifacts. But rumors began sweeping the treasure-hunting crowd. Could they have found one of the three missing ships from the 1715 fleet?
Captain Crack anchored a safe distance away and staked them out with a telescope. Divers were making too many trips up to the boat for simple historical excavation. Handing too many baskets of whatever up to a deckhand.
After three days of surveillance, Crack headed out at night with two trusted assistants he had handpicked because of their prison records. They anchored over the site and dove.
Jackpot.
The only pressure was time, and it wasn’t how long it took to find the loot, but how fast they could fill their baskets. Gold, silver, rubies, sapphires. It all went up to the cigarette boat.
After the sixth dive, the baskets came aboard. Suddenly: “Uh-oh.”
A bright search beam shone in the distance. It came at them fast from the deck of a speeding vessel. Then a megaphone. “What the fuck are you doing on our site?”
Soon they were side by side in the water. Because of the lawlessness of the seas, everyone out there has guns, and now they were all drawn in a standoff.
Captain Crack tried to chill it out with lies. “We had no idea the site was claimed.”
“Bullshit! Give us everything you have on your boat!”
“We didn’t find anything yet,” said Crack.
“Then we’re coming aboard!”
“Then we’ll kill you,” said Crack. “And we’ll get away with it under federal piracy laws for illegal boarding at sea.”
The professional crew fumed. They were hardened, but not tough enough to get in a gun battle over a fraction of their find. Their leader finally waved his rifle toward shore. “Get out of here and never come back! Or next time we will shoot!”
Chapter 10
Central Florida
The back road ran through God’s country.
Town after small town. Little Florida places with names like Weirsdale, Citra, Lochloosa, Waldo, Starke and several more that were so tiny they didn’t appear on maps. Volunteer fire departments, hardware stores, barbershops, old movie theaters on Main Street playing only one film, always rated G. Signs at the city limits indicated the Kiwanis and Rotary Club were still at it. Other signs were handmade by Girl Scouts for a spaghetti dinner that Friday. There were antiques stores and ice cream stands, billboards for salvation and speed traps, water towers of all shapes, some celebrating high school championships.
And the churches.
Bright white wooden churches, red-brick churches, and churches in converted farm buildings. Some houses of worship sat crowded together in competition; others alone in cattle pastures.
There were short steeples, tall steeples, and open-sided steeples with big bells. Lutheran, Presbyterian, Pentecostal, and AME Zion. Baptist, Anabaptist, and Primitive Baptist. Some had lighted signs with attempts at humor: Eternity: Smoking or Nonsmoking? Choose the Bread of Life or You Are Toast. Some unintentionally so: Accepting Applications for Missionary Position.
The back road was actually several roads, stitched together on an old gas station map the night before by Serge. It would be a long drive to the next tour stop, and he shuddered at the thought of spending all that time on an interstate.
The ’69 Plymouth entered Ocklawaha. Soon, a two-story country home with a sweeping front porch came into view. Serge’s camera was out the window again. Click, click, click.
“It’s just an old house,” said Coleman.
“And one so historically important that when the land was sold from under it, they barged the whole thing across Lake Weir to this location.”
“So what’s its deal?”
“Back during the Depression, the infamous Ma Barker Gang terrorized the nation with a spree of bank robberies and kidnappings. In 1935, the FBI finally traced the outfit to Florida and this house, where Ma Barker—also known as Machine Gun Kate—was hiding out under an assumed name with several associates. A gun battle ensued, and the house was sprayed with more than four thousand bullets. Apparently the holes have been patched.”
“That’s a stone trip,” said Coleman.
“It was a different era,” said Serge. “They actually laid out the bullet-riddled bodies and sold the photos as postcards to mail back to loved ones: ‘Having a great time in Florida, unlike these assholes.’”
Serge stowed the camera and sped north. They passed citrus stands and boiled-peanut stands and someone in overalls walking along the side of the road with a sewing machine in a wheelbarrow. They continued on over hill and dale. One of the countless churches was coming up. Threshing machines worked the field next door. It was a Sunday morning, and the last service had long since let out.
As Serge passed by, he noticed three people on the front steps. A pastor was comforting a distraught couple. The woman cried inconsolably.
“Uh-oh,” said Serge. “That’s my bat signal.”
He made a fishtailing U-turn in the middle of the lonely road and sped back. He ran up to the steps in no time. “Pardon me, but I couldn’t help but notice you’re upset.”
The pastor had an arm around the woman’s shoulders. He looked up. “It’ll be fine.”
“No, it won’t!” sobbed the woman.
“Why don’t you tell me about it?” said Serge.
“Excuse me,” said the preacher. “Who are you?”
“Who are you?” said Serge.
“Pastor Donovan, but I—”
“The name’s Serge.” He shook the preacher’s hand. “I roam the countryside, enjoying fresh air, monitoring my hygiene, and helping the downtrodden. Favorite food: pizza. Turnoffs: the word conflate and women who think a small dog in a purse is a fashion accessory.”
A voice arriving from behind. “I’m Coleman . . .” Trip, splat.
Serge looked down and shook his head, then raised his face again. “Now, how may I be of assistance?”
“I don’t think you can,” said Donovan.
“Then what have you got to lose?” He turned toward the couple. “And you are . . . ?”
“Buford and Agnes Whorley, of the Nantucket Whorleys,” said the man. “We retired here ten years ago.”
Agnes broke down again. “And now we have no place to go!”
Serge straightened up with an odd look. “Why not go to where you’ve been the last ten years?”
Her face was buried in her hands. “We can’t! It was stolen from us!”
“This is sounding complicated.” Serge turned to address Buford. “Can you back up and explain from the beginning?”
“The house was all bought and paid for, our life savings,” said Buford. “But then we began running short on the monthly bills. Who knew we’d live this long, or stuff would get so expensive?”