“The Kill Devil? About a mile or so out that way, hidden in that cove over there,” Sam said, pointing to a curved finger of high land jutting into the water on the other side of the Sound. “They’re risking it for sure. There’s a twelve-mile limit. Any boat caught inside that limit can be picked off by the Coast Guard—or pirates. I’m guessing the Kill Devil’s got some secret storage inside her to take that risk.”
“Are you saying we could be arrested?”
Sam shrugged. “Or shot.”
Sam helped Evie into the boat. It wobbled precariously as he hopped on board and took a seat himself.
“If this kills me, I’ll never forgive you,” Evie groused.
Sam leaned over with a pair of binoculars. “The list of things you’ll never forgive me for is long, Sheba. Just keep your peepers peeled for the Coast Guard. Ow!”
“What?”
Sam rubbed his left eye. “Your funny hat just got me in the peeper.”
“Well, you insulted it,” Evie said, raising the binoculars and looking out at the open water for signs of trouble. “The Scots are not a forgiving people. Neither are their hats.”
Sam leaned over the stern and looped the string around the outboard motor, pulling until it sputtered into noisy motion. Evie shivered as Sam steered them across the calm water, watching the darkened houses of Long Island growing smaller. From where she sat, they seemed content, tucked into the cove like sleeping children. She wanted to ask Sam if he ever felt frightened about the danger they’d face if Will and Miss Walker were right about the coming storm. She wanted to tell him how she still had awful nightmares about James. But it didn’t seem like the sort of conversation to have while shouting over the hammering of a motorboat.
When they’d put enough sea behind them, Sam rounded the cove, and Evie saw the Kill Devil. It wasn’t a schooner, low and fast like most rum runners. The Kill Devil was a yacht, easily more than one hundred feet long, and there was a party taking place on board. Two smaller boats were speeding away, their bellies presumably filled with crates of booze smuggled in from Canada. Sam cut the motor as they pulled up alongside the ship. Two crewmen peered down from the deck. They did not look friendly to Evie. Sam stood and waved his arms, rocking the boat as he called out, “Ahoy! Permission to board? Eloise sent me,” Sam said, using the password he’d been given. “Said I should talk to Captain Moony himself.”
A rope ladder tumbled down and thumped against the boat’s flank.
Evie eyed the swaying ladder. “Every time I go somewhere with you, Sam, I’m sure it’ll be the end of me. And my shoes,” she sighed as she climbed.
On deck, a few gangsters and their molls laughed it up. A balding man played a banjo while two flappers in beaded dresses and furs, stockings rolled down to show off rouged knees, danced the Charleston, stopping to swig from unmarked brown bottles—the good stuff that hadn’t been cut with water and cheap grain liquor yet. As she and Sam passed by, Evie raised her hands in the air like a holy roller. “Beware the dangers of demon rum! That way lies eeeevillll!” she thundered in her best Sarah Snow impression, making Sam laugh full out, and just like that, her mood lifted, and she was glad she’d come.
“Say, you folks don’t know where a fella could find the lavatory, do you?” a drunken passenger asked.
“Sure. It’s this way.” Sam stuck out his arm and narrowed his eyes, concentrating. “Don’t see me.”
The man went slack. Sam reached into his pocket and took out a chunk of cash.
“Sam!” Evie said, looking over her shoulder. “What are you doing?”
“We might need extra money for information.”
“That’s terrible!”
“Yeah? Say, when did you develop a conscience?”
“About the time I started reading people’s secrets for a living,” Evie said, but she was laughing. “And I hate having a conscience. Very inconvenient.”
Sam unfolded the man’s money, lifted a twenty, and put the rest back in the man’s pocket. “Happy now, Sheba?”
Evie pursed her lips and looked toward the ship’s ceiling. “That depends. Are you sore about it, Sam?”
“Yes.”
She looped her arm through his. “Then I’m happy.”
Sam burst into laughter. “Okay, Lamb Chop. You win.”
That was the thing about being with Evie—she was a high-wire act, exciting and dangerous and exhilarating. When Sam had run away from home to find his mother, he’d joined up with Barnes & Bellwether’s Traveling Circus Pandemonium. They’d given him passage, and in return, he’d worked for them, first as a roustabout, then as a clown, and then, when it was discovered that he was quick on his feet, as a tumbler and acrobat. His most vivid memory was hanging by his knees from the trapeze bar, arms out, ready to catch the flier, his stomach somersaulting with high-stakes expectation. As they stole belowdeck in search of Moony Runyon, Sam felt that same fluttering excitement. Some of it was the hope that he would finally get some answers about Project Buffalo and the whereabouts of his missing mother. The other part was pure Evie, the two of them, an adventurous team, up for anything. Sure, Evie was selfish sometimes. She liked being the star. But she would do anything for her friends, Sam included. That was what he couldn’t tell her—that the end of their fake romance was really about saving himself. He’d gone goofy for her, and if she broke his heart, that would be the end of the best friendship he’d ever had. He couldn’t risk that.
“You think there are pirates on board?” Evie whispered, her eyes alight with puckish mischief.
“We can always hope,” Sam said, feeling alive.
At the very back of the boat, they came to a door with a sign reading, CAPTAIN’S QUARTERS. KEEP OUT. YES, THAT MEANS YOU.
“Very welcoming,” Evie said, and opened the door without knocking. The modest cabin was mostly dark, the only light coming from a desk lamp. A potbellied man glared at her from behind that desk. His hands were wrapped around a mug. A half-empty bottle of whiskey sat nearby. “What’s the big idea? Can’t you read?” he growled.
“Oh, I’m afraid not. Tragic accident in the convent. I stared too long at the rays of the sun coming through the stained-glass windows. The nuns are still praying for my recovery,” Evie said breezily, taking in the whole of the close quarters, whose every inch of wall space was occupied by bleached sea creature bones. “My. What a lot of dead things you have in here. I can only imagine what your nursery was like.”
“Moony Runyon?” Sam asked before the man could get up and throw them out.
“Who wants to know?” It was more command than question.
“A fella interested in knowing what happened to Ben Arnold,” Sam answered.
Moony Runyon settled back against his chair. “Oh. It’s you. Wasn’t sure if you were coming. You have the money?”
Sam offered the fifty dollars he’d made lifting wallets in Central Park plus the twenty he’d just taken from the drunken party guest. Captain Moony gestured for them to sit. Sam dragged over two skinny chairs—one for himself and one for Evie—from a narrow table against the wall.
Captain Moony counted the money while he talked. “Heard old Ben ended up dead on an ash heap. He never was too careful. Me? I’m careful.” He slapped a knife on the table and stuffed the money into his pocket. “So. What was it you wanted to know?”