Last Assault on Oak Island

Last Assault on Oak Island

by

Jenn Rekka

Published by:

Echo Press on Smashwords

Last Assault on Oak Island

Copyright © 2013 by Jenn Rekka

Smashwords Edition License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

Author's Note

Although this book is fiction, the Money Pit on Oak Island, Nova Scotia, Canada, is real. It was discovered in 1795 by teenage Daniel McGinnis and has remained a mystery, despite vigorous efforts by many people, to the time of this writing. This story is based on factual research, but does not represent any treasure hunting operation conducted on Oak Island.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Last Assault on Oak Island

Chapter 1

Saul dangled 120 feet at the end of the cable, cursing. The metal casing of railroad tank cars around him was an eight-foot-wide intestine as he hovered suspended in the island’s belly. Static buzzed at his headset.

He scowled at the metal surrounding him. Larsen there yet?

His hard fingers felt a rusty patch of metal wall. A coppery slime covered his glove. The voice in his headset was tinny and far away. If he shows up, he said into the microphone bobbing near his stubbly chin, tell him he’s fired. And tell him he’s the worst damn engineer I’ve seen in thirty years.

A chunk of rust fell. Far below it dropped into saltwater.

He didn’t watch the rust fall, nor did he hear the splash it made. Is Miles back?

A rumble growled beneath him. Saul put a steadying hand to the wall as he looked down. His headlamp made a spot on the ringed water far below. The shudder grew to a bellow, bringing the water to a churn. The casing ten feet below suddenly squeezed shut, burping the rising water closer to his boots.

Saul knew what it meant, feared what it meant. Up! Up! Bring me up! Now!

The noise of the winch above was drowned out by screeching metal as the shaft below collapsed. Water rushed in from the buckling seams. It rose to Saul’s boots in five seconds. The pinching metal forced it higher.

At the top of that hole in the ground, two workmen pulled a drenched Saul three seconds from a crushing death.

Carlos Sheldon was the most unlikely of curators. To look at him, one would not imagine that this short, balding man commanded half the second floor of the Carnegie Museum of Antiquities in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

When Lauren Gates first began working as Carlos’ student assistant two years ago, she had no idea of the man’s far-reaching authority. Because of his exacting work and undisputed word on ancient manuscripts and illuminations they had traveled the world extensively during her term as part-time assistant.

But nothing compared to this trip.

She pushed her hair out her face, letting the brunette waves settle to her shoulder as looked out the plane window at the approaching land mass on the Atlantic seaboard. Nova Scotia was easternmost of New Brunswick, Canada, a province of British and French descendants freckled with minorities of Irish, Scottish, and Indians.

As usual, Carlos had told her little about their trip, leaving her to speculate not only as to their goal, but destination, too. Usually he at least told her that, if nothing else, but this time he had been especially secretive.

It was part of the draw of being his assistant, that flirtatious hinting without telling. Usually she liked it, but not so much when the details were so sketchy. She put together what she already knew from the subtle hints Carlos had dropped about the mail he had received the past month at his museum office. She came up with very little.

All she had to go on this time were a few letters from Rudolph Maddock, Carlos’ long-time friend who lived somewhere in West Winds or Lunenburg, Nova Scotia. She hadn’t read the letters herself, but the envelopes were postmarked from both cities. From what Carlos had said on other occasions, she knew that Rudy operated the last manual lighthouse on Mahone Bay.

That was all she knew, and she couldn’t imagine why they were going there to represent the museum now. I give up, she finally said in exasperation, glancing to him beside her seat.

Carlos didn’t even open his eyes, but a small smile twitched at his lips. Now, Lauren, think, he said in a steady voice. Remember the newsletter last month? Don’t frown; it’ll give you wrinkles.

She immediately stopped scowling, her green eyes opening wider, refraining from rolling them at his motherly tendencies. Last month was the May issue, she recalled. Cooper made assistant director; acquisition of the Lenham Porcelain Collection from England House; Marie Davis had a baby girl; the Sisters of the-

No, no. He looked at her with one eye. Something on a broader scale. Something about two-hundred-years old.

She sighed and looked back down at the cobalt waters out the window. Does is have anything to do with Rudy Maddock?

Yes.

She didn’t make the connection. He runs a lighthouse in Mahone Bay, and the newsletter said nothing about Canada, or Nova Scotia, or... Oh, it did. She thought back on the newsletter’s contents. Oak Island. Is that it, Carlos?

And what’s on Oak Island?

She thought for a moment, then laughed. The Money Pit. Right? Of course.

His face was unreadable.

What do you...? No. What does Rudy know? She sat straighter. Did they find something?

He smiled broadly. We’re not sure.

He must have. If you got money out of Stends and Cooper for this trip there must be some gain for the museum. She took his arm. Does Rudy know what’s buried there?

Not exactly. He patted her arm. It could be nothing at all, Lauren, but he’s seen enough to convince me, and Stends, to examine his...well, his evidence.

She sat back in her seat, watching him relax in his seat.

She would get no more out of Carlos until they landed, but now she had something tangible to think about until they landed.

She thought back on what she knew about the find. The Money Pit had been discovered in 1795 by a teen boy named Daniel McGinnis. He and his friends, Anthony Vaughan and John Smith, dug up what appeared to be an old shaft sunk years before. At the time they had dreams of pirate treasure, but that was only one theory to become connected with the pit.

During the initial digging the boys had hit a layer of flagstones at a couple of feet down and a layer of old logs another ten feet down. From then on they found oak logs every ten feet, and at times other foreign materials such as charcoal, putty and coconut fiber were uncovered.

Smith and McGinnis later purchased property on the island, but no treasure was ever recovered. An operation at the turn of the twentieth century had taken the hunt to nearly 100 feet, still with no treasure to show.

There were other excavations later. Sporadic efforts by several operations were made in the nineteenth century to recover whatever lay at the bottom of the Money Pit. Even celebrities like F.D. Roosevelt and Errol Flynn had been drawn to the mysterious pit at one time or another.

Now Carlos and George Stends, director of the museum, had taken a decided interest in the age-old hole in the ground. By the smug look on Carlos’ face, Lauren could tell Rudy had definitely made a remarkable discovery of some kind.

Her mind wandered along a very romantic path, envisioning the controversial treasure being the Holy Grail or lost royal jewels. She had read the fantastic stories in some of the questionably legitimate trade magazines about fortune hunters. The anniversary of two centuries of the hunt that summer was a milestone that brought out new theories and all sorts of articles. The one that now came to Lauren’s mind was about a man named Clement or Clemens who claimed only pirate treasure could be at the bottom of the pit.

In the article, which was verified by dubious ‘experts’, Clemens had stated both Captain William Kidd and the notorious Blackbeard had referred to buried treasures. When she read it, Lauren dismissed the pirate theory because the Money Pit was too well engineered for the common lot termed pirate in days of old.

But she had no viable theory to replace that common thought.

They landed at the small Mahone Bay airport and were met by a Captain Maruso who took them by boat, the Second Wind, to Oak Island, unaware of the pair of eyes that watched every move.

Welcome! Maruso called as they approached the 42-foot boat bearing the fanciful lettering of Second Wind tethered to the dock. Come aboard, Doctor, Lauren!

He tipped his hat, giving Lauren a good-natured grin. She found it a little friendlier than needed, especially coming from someone built more like he should be hauling in industrial fishing nets single-handedly than trawling the bay. He was in his mid- to late-twenties, she guessed, with dark hair and eyes. She returned a small smile as he grabbed her bags from her hand.

Carlos cleared his throat and stepped aboard the boat, eyes on the island in the bay. "Thank you, Captain. This is Lauren, my student assistant. Lauren, Captain Maruso of the Second Wind."

Before Lauren could move, Maruso prodded her along short gangplank that moved with the boat’s bobbing on the water.

...Thanks. Nice to meet you, she said, tripping down the few steps from the dock at low tide.

Settled in? Maruso asked, not waiting for a reply as he brushed past his new passengers and untied the ropes tethering the boat to the dock. Off we go.

Lauren thought the use of the boat a little odd, considering the causeway that breached the short distance to the island. She grabbed a railing as the Second Wind was suddenly loosened from the dock.

She glanced from Maruso to Carlos, who was still looking out across the brilliantly blue water.

The boat gained speed and headed out to circle around the opposite side of Oak Island.

Carlos and Maruso exchanged a few words as they made the bend in the eastern shore of the island moments later and Lauren could see the brick lighthouse on-land. The island itself wasn’t large and was just a dot on most maps of Nova Scotia. Maruso had a map of the bay it was on that he showed them, issued by a tourism group, but other than that, the island was too small to matter to many people. It was only one of the nearest to the mainland of over 350 scattered in the bay.

Nor did it occur to Lauren Captain Maruso was to be provisional in capacities other than transportation.

When they docked the Second Wind down shore from the lighthouse and piled their luggage into a waiting Jeep she realized that he, too, was going to play a role in what she was beginning to think of as the Maddock-Sheldon expedition.

Why else, she wondered, would they need a private transport? She found herself studying him from the back seat of the Jeep as he drove. He glanced to the rearview mirror to see her, grinned, and took the vehicle down the dirt road to the lighthouse. The noise of earth drills was loud around them.

On the way from the mainland and to the lighthouse Maruso hadn’t mentioned the pit in any personal manner, only commenting how the 200th anniversary of the mysterious hole brought more new business for the summer. Most of these were vendors and concession stands, converted trailers for the most part. Nothing permanent.

Maruso pointed to the interior of the island as they passed a slight bend in the road. You’ll get used to the racket, he said over the noise.

Lauren nodded, watching Carlos’ gaze focus on the direction of the unseen drilling rigs. She looked back to Maruso. He was a few steps above the fishermen she’d seen at the docks, but in no way yacht-owning material.

They turned the round of single-lane road to meet the house for the lightkeeper. It was small, but well-kept, finished in a dark red brick to match the tower that rose a hundred feet from it, glass panes at the top clear and unlit in the daylight. A small garden was left of the house and even lines of green shoots were visible.

Well, well, a voice greeted them from the porch of the cottage as Maruso parked the Jeep. A short man of Carlos’ age with a belly stood there, standing akimbo at the door. He raised a hand. Good to see you, Carlos! Thanks, Captain Maruso!

Carlos climbed out of the Jeep more limberly than his 70 years should have allowed. Rudy! You look well, my friend.

Lauren watched Carlos and Rudy as she got out and snagged her bags before Maruso could open her door.

Maruso looked slighted as she moved down the cobble path with her bags. You’re making it look bad, you know?

She turned and gave him a confused look as she hitched one of her bag straps over her shoulder. I am?

He shot a look at Carlos, who was already at the porch with Rudy, and then back at her. Yeah. You are.

...Sorry, she mumbled, uncertain.

They went inside the small cottage and Carlos made hasty introductions to the lightkeeper as they sat at the tiny kitchen’s table. The suitcases and bags were stowed in the sitting room nearby as Rudy kept a lively banter with Carlos over the noise of the drilling from the operations working the island.

The anniversary this year has led to a riotous attraction, Rudy said with a thick French accent. He bustled around the room, wedging his potbellied-self between the backs of chairs and the walnut hutch behind him. But that won’t concern us. Tea for everyone? That’s why I agreed to enlist Captain Maruso.

Lauren looked to the man sitting across the table from her. He smiled, taking off his cap and running a hand through his dark hair.

Transportation is essential, Rudy added. So is silence. Already Clemens is suspicious.

Lauren was about to ask for details on Clemens, wondering if he was the same man who had written the article a few years ago, when she took a sip of her tea Rudy placed before her. It was more than the heat that scorched her throat.

Maruso chuckled. Watch out for Rudy. He spikes everything.

She gave her tea a suspicious look. Thanks.

Rudy closed the curtains over the small windows at the sink and counter.

Where is it? Carlos wanted to know, tapping the table with his fingers.

Safe. Rudy smiled in a taunting manner. First let me tell you more about how I got it. He sat down in the remaining chair. My nephew Phil is quite an auction-goer and he got it in Sussex at the Brielle estate sale about six months ago. The Brielles were once a prominent British family until late in the eighteenth century. They lost credibility with the Crown in 1780 or so when their foremost member of the Royal Navy, Admiral Claude Brielle, somehow lost or stole a payroll destined for the troops in Virginia during the American Revolution. According to the family’s accepted history, Admiral Brielle claims to have been attacked by privateers and the bankroll stolen.

How much? Carlos asked.

A little over two million pounds. Rudy smiled. "No one believed Brielle’s story for several reasons. According to habit, privateers take everything of value when they attack, and Brielle’s ship, the Lady Grey, had silver flatware aboard when she returned to Britain. Another oddity is that the ship’s log placed the vessel off the coast of what is now Black Island Sound, New York, at the time of the attack. He sat back, shaking his head. The Lady Grey was to take troops and the payroll to Virginia – part pay and part bribe during the war – and never should have been that far north. She departed in September of 1776 and returned in 1777.

Brielle tried to blame the tardiness on the privateer incident and getting lost, he said, downing half his tea in a gulp. Also onboard was a man from the Royal British Engineers. His name was Stuart and he was sort of an unofficial observer or advisor from Parliament that Brielle was supposed to drop off with troops in Virginia. Unfortunately, he was killed in the fight with the privateers.

Conveniently, Carlos added.

Exactly.

Lauren watched the three men looked at each other for several long moments as if a conspiratorial note had suddenly been passed among them that skipped her.

You have the ship’s log? she asked. She couldn’t wait for Carlos to elaborate.

No, both Carlos and Rudy said in unison.

We have Brielle’s personal account of the war, Rudy admitted modestly. A journal written in his own hand.

She smiled a little. Really?

Everyone nodded.

Debatable now is not the authenticity of the diary - to us, Rudy continued as he stood and filled everyone’s cup with tea again, "but if Brielle did indeed bury anything on Oak Island. The timeframe is right, and so is the amount of money missing. As for the opportunity, motive, and resources, Brielle had them all. Two million pounds can foster greed in anyone, especially a man halfway across the world, carrying government money. The Lady Grey had a crew of ninety - more than enough to carry out an operation like the Money Pit. Stuart could have supplied the technology. Maybe he even got a split from Brielle at a later date."

Lauren was still skeptical. But what makes you think the journal has anything to do with the pit? Is it mentioned?

I can’t read it; that’s why Carlos is here, Rudy said with no real regret as he sat back in his chair. In 1803, a stone was found in the pit with a coded inscription. It was deciphered by a computer cryptologist as reading ‘Forty feet below two million pounds are buried’. That’s where the amount two million comes from. The journal uses a similar code in several places.

Rudy stood and found a paper in the sitting room secretary and returned. He put it on the table before Carlos. A series of dots, slashes, triangles, and squares formed two lines.

That’s a copy of the original inscription. The rock itself has long-since disappeared. Rudy leaned over his tea, adding an extra shot of brandy from a bottle beside the centerpiece of ketchup and hot sauce. Brielle had an interest in history, mainly that of his own family, and an affection for the Old English and French dialects. The ship’s log was written in Modern English, but his personal diary is entirely in old text.

Lauren looked to Carlos. She resented being the odd man out in this venture, especially when a stranger like Maruso knew more than she did.

Time for that issue later, she decided. Her eyes rested on the paper Carlos was fingering.

So it was a treasure hunt.

Chapter 2

Saul was out of the shower and at his desk when Miles stepped into the office trailer. An urgent concern veiled Miles’ eyes as he estimated his father. It was a prematurely old look on the lanky youth yet to turn twenty, but Miles had learned to wear it. However, that relief was tempered with a weary frustration.

Noise from the drilling rig subdued as he shut the door.

Saul looked up. You get the report?

Miles dropped a large envelope of papers on the desk, running a hand through his white-blond hair. MacClure told me what happened. You all right, Dad?

Saul nodded, frowning at the new paperwork. But Larsen’s gone. The drunk.

Miles sunk into a chair opposite the desk. How bad is it?

Saul shrugged, flipping through a few pages of the report, pausing at the last page. About fifteen meters squeezed shut. We can pump it out, jack it open and weld enough new plating in by the end of the week. He tossed the report to Miles' side of the desk.

Rudy has company. Americans, I think. Maruso’s girl and her old man. Miles didn’t take the report, letting it rest on the desk edge.

Is that what we’re supposed to think?

Miles shrugged, finally taking the report and thumbing through it. He frowned at the final page. "You said to watch Rudy, and that’s what I seen. Maybe they are just company."

And maybe they’re not. Saul took the report his son handed him. You ever see Rudy in a library until three weeks ago? He’s been getting a lot of mail from a museum in Pennsylvania. Does that sound like our lightkeeper? He looked at the last page of the report again, large hands tight on the paper. I tell you, he’s got something. A map.

Museums don’t cater much to Blackbeard stories, Dad, Miles said dryly.

Saul’s face darkened immediately, but Miles continued before he could speak.

Okay. Sorry. Miles sent a hand through his hair, half wanting to pull out a handful. "What do you want me to do? Charter a fishing trip on the Second Wind? Ask