11. Tings Nov 11

(7:31 am Nov 11, 2005)

Wreck.

Wreck. Wrecking. A one time "industry" in the Bahamas. If you come to the islands, ask around for some wrecking stories, or, if you have internet access, try googling for yourself.

It is one thing to salvage the contents of a ship that runs aground, to help save the people from the ship. It is another entirely to set a light in the wrong place in order to lead the ship onto the reef.

That is all I shall say here. Remember, ask around. It is amazing the wealth of knowledge that resides in the older generation. (Knowledge that is fast being lost, I might add.) Even in the smaller communities, perhaps even especially in the smaller communities.

The incessant ringing of the phone woke Bruno from a vivid dream, a dream of musical energy. It was Jelli's brother asking if Bruno knew what had happened to him. It seems Cay Dreams had been found anchoured off Dick's Point this morning but there was no sing of Jelli. There was a large slippery dick in the bottom of the boat with a hook in its mouth. A tangle of fishing line and some conch cut up on a piece of plywood. There was an old hickory butcher knife with dried conch still on the blade embedded into the plywood. All but the position of the knife seemed normal. But no Jelli.

Bruno got up right away and headed over to Jelli's house where his brother was calling from.

(7:56 am Nov 11, 2005)

Melody woke up and had a light breakfast. She took a quick shower and got dressed and then walked two blocks to the studio to begin work for the day. Now, you may find this hard to believe, but music was not melody's full time gig. It was something that she did on the side. Oh, it was something that she was full time alright, but she only did it on the side.

In actuality, Melody was an artist full time. She spent her days painting and sketching. Mostly island scenes, but she also ventured into the more abstract and, although she kept it separate from her main line of work by using a "pen name" for that part of her work, she also dabbled in scifi stuff.

She made a nice little income from that. Lately, a few of her works had been used as covers for some top selling scifi books. Her reputation in that genre was on the upswing. So was the income from that area.

Today, though, it would be seascapes. The time she spent painting the sea was some of her best. Perhaps it was because to her eye, there was always something musical about the sea. Something that called out to every fiber of her being. She often came up with some of her best tunes while painting the sea. Sometimes here in the studio, but often on location.

On location, sitting in light shade, the sun bright, the water so clear and blue that it almost hurt. The gentle breeze offering a little coolness to dry the glow on her face. Where had she heard the line, "Horses sweat, man perspire, but women glow?" Well, the breeze helped with the glowing.

(8:19 am Nov 11, 2005)

(5:54 pm Nov 11, 2005)

Fort.

We have already brushed by a few forts if I recall correctly, or in the parlance of the net, IIRC.

You have basically three forts in Nassau, four if you count the one that is no longer and more still depending on how loose a definition of forts you have. And that is if you are counting military type forts. If you want to count tree forts, good luck with that.

Let's see...

Fort Montague.

Fort Fincastle.

Fort Charlotte.

Fort Nassau. The one that is missing if you care to count it.

Fort Winton. Now we are into that loose definition. Most likely battery would be a better word. A cool place none the less.

Blackbeard's Tower. A stone tower on a ridge. How loose can we get?

Was there ever an old fort to go with Old Fort Bay? I can't seem to call up any memories at this point.

And then there are the childhood tree forts which we have agreed not to get into counting. They were a lot of fun though. Sometimes you will see them referred to as tree houses.

(6:11 pm Nov 11, 2005)

Ezza had known about some underground tunnels on the island, but he would not have dreamed that what he was finding could have been possible. He felt like he kept repeating himself with his amazement, both with himself and in his remarks to Cang. And if the tunnels were unbelievable, Ezza didn't know what to call the treasure. The sheer volume of treasure that they passed as the walked the passages was beyond belief. They were going to have to think long and hard as to what was they best way to deal with a treasure trove of this magnitude.

For now though, he and Cang spent their evening planning the next day's plans. Ezza was now happy at the compromise that Cang had talked him into. It was much better to walk the length of the tunnels and take in the immenseness of it all than to hang around near the entrance doing a detailed search. They would have time for that later if they kept their wits about them.

---

Jelli had still not turned up and Bruno, along with his family and friends were getting worried. No body had turned up. The police, the defense force and BASRA had all searched without result. A couple of his friends with small planes had gone up and others who scuba dived had gone down. No results there either. Other than his boat, safely anchoured, there was no trace of him.

Bruno was supposed to be going out with Melody again tonight, but his heart was not in it. He called her and asked her if she would come by Jelli's house where the family were gathered to go over what had been done and to make further plans. She agreed and he said he would drive by to pick her up.

---

Heath was back making his rounds of the harbour. He had still not figured out what had happened to Mr. Lee and he was still perturbed as a result. Right now, he was cruising under some of the large cruise ships checking out their hulls.

Dubloon.

Dubloon. Escudo. Gold. Spanish gold. The Spanish Main. Silver. Jewels. Treasure. (and for those of you from the sixties, a night spot popular with a certain crowd.) Pirates. Plunder. Hurricanes. Shipwrecks. Salvage. The Jolly Roger. Nassau.

Ezza suspected that much of the treasure they would find in the tunnels would be from the Spanish Main. Perhaps there would even be some from the orient. Cang agreed. XXIII was only mildly interested in the treasure, he was more interested in the history, at least that was what he claimed. Ezza was not so sure of that. How could you completely trust a soldier crab?

(6:44 pm Nov 11, 2005)

Bruno arrived back at Jelli's with Melody and they went inside. Jelli's brother Rocky was there as well his parents. His sister Cinnamon had gone out to get some chicken from the shack for everyone.

Bruno made introductions all around.

(6:50 pm Nov 11, 2005)

(7:22 pm Nov 11, 2005)

A horn tootled outside and Bruno looked out of the window. Cinnamon was pulling her Prelude into the driveway. Bruno and Melody went out to help her bring in the food.

Everyone sat around the house, eating and talking over the possibilities. Some were crying softly from time to time though trying to put on a brave face and not let anyone see them at it. No one wanted wailing to break out at this time.

Shortly after the food was over, Jelli's parents announced that they were going home to try and get some rest and encouraged everyone else to try and do likewise and that they would be back early in the morning to start again.

Bruno walked them out to their Fit and again expressed his encouragement. "Good to meet you Mrs. Rolle, see you in the morning sir.

---

Bing and Boom were in another club, further east than last night. There weren't may patrons here yet as da youts dem dese days tended to go home for a nap after work before waking up, getting something to eat and then dressing to go out for the night quite late.

It just did not make sense that they could not find a trace of Cang and XXIII. Unless they were actively trying to hide, that is. Had they made a grave mistake in trying to free XXIII that night in Spanish Wells. Could those two possibly know they were being actively hunted?

---

"Sal, I'm getting worried, Bing and Boom have not turned up any leads so far and time is marching on. We may not have much time. And I don't like the chances we have been taking without their knowledge either. Those are dangerous games we are playing there. We cannot keep them up for long before we are sure to get caught."

"I know Uncle, but what choices do we have? We can't sit around and just wait? Like you say, time may be running out on us. We have to do something."

---

Gold.

Gold. Au. 79. 196.9665. 1337.33. 3129.15. 1.79. 1.34. 2.4. 118.

2, 8, 18,32,18,1

Gold. Now most people immediately think of dancers when they hear the word although, due to the nature of this book so far, you may have thought of something else when you just read the word recently.

---

I've searched the whole train and I canna find him. (Cue laughter.)

---

There is a faint, greenish glow and the air is damp and salty. There is the sound of waves. The captives sit with their backs to the limestone walls, trying to find some comfort and get some rest. Each is handcuffed with hands behind the back and then the cuffs chained to an old, iron ring attached to the walls. They each have hoods over their heads so they cannot see one another, but they have been allowed to talk. They are taken one by one each day to another room to be fed and then to get some exercise before being hooded again and let back to be chained once more.

(7:51 pm Nov 11, 2005)

(8:15 pm Nov 11, 2005)

Bruno left to drop Melody home and then go home himself. Rocky said he would stay here in case Jelli turned up.

The two of them held hands during the drive home. Bruno scanned the dial on his FM and it locked on to a new station that claimed to be in testing mode. He liked some of their stuff but he was restless tonight and set the radio scanning again. Every once in a while, he told himself he would have to rig a clicker for his gadget.

He dropped Melody in front of her house and she leaned over and gave him a small kiss and squeezed his hand before getting out and going inside.

Bruno drove home in silence and tried to get his mind in gear for the writing he needed to try and do when he got home. He hoped there would be no power issues this weekend. He tried to do a little plotting and planning on the drive home as well.

(8:21 pm Nov 11, 2005)

(8:32 pm Nov 11, 2005)

Bruno got home and smiled as he heard Red singing. These street lights caused havoc with the birds sleeping patterns. As he approached the porch, he saw something scurry beneath it out of the corner of his eye.

He went inside and booted up Lobo. Tux soon grinned at him briefly. He went to the kitchen and returned with a glass of ice tea and a bag of roasted peanuts he had bought from a corner vendor earlier in the day.

He logged in and went through his routine in preparation for writing. Log into this IM accounts with gaim. Fire up xchat. Open firefox. Open an xterm. Change to the novel's data directory. Start up leo with the leo file for his novel. Start up abiword and load in today's chapter. Check his email and get rid of the mass quantities of spam and deal with the few remaining messages. Try and get something worthwhile written in abiword. Try to get some speed going. Try not to get sidetracked. Try not to get into the googling or editing temporal black holes.

Try and hit his daily goal of two thousand words. Tonight though, he was in a bind, cause he was way behind and he would have to try and write faster and make some headway on his task of catching up to where he should be. He must not stay up too late though as he wanted to crank out at least two days quota tomorrow and the next day.

He loaded up a quiet playlist in xmms and fell into a zone, his fingers making music as the tapped the keys.

(8:46 pm Nov 11, 2005)