Clive Cussler; Craig Dirgo (27 page)

Slapping my passport down with glee at the immigration booth, I was given a green light. “Welcome back to the United States, Mr. Cussler,” said the agent, with a friendly smile. “I read all your books.”

It sure was nice to be home.

Upon reaching the lobby of the terminal, I was surprised to see no Craig. A German like me, he prides himself on following schedules. I was sure he was supposed to meet me. I was looking around for a telephone when he strolled by, sipping a cup of coffee. He looked at me queerly.

“You’re an hour early,” he said, taking a sip.

I actually hugged him, I was so glad to see someone I knew.

“Lynx Air has a fetish for departing and arriving early,” I explained.

Craig stared at me. “Good God, boss,” he said slowly, “you look like you’ve seen a ghost. What in the hell did they do to you?”

“I’ll explain it to you someday,” I said. “Right now, why don’t you take me to the hotel?”

Craig grabbed my bags and started walking to his car. “We’ll go get you checked in,” he said slyly, “then there’s a Haitian restaurant I’ve been wanting to try—they say the jerked goat is tasty.”

After checking into the hotel, we went to a good old American steak house. Craig had a sirloin, I had a chopped steak. Chopped steak just like my mother used to make.

In a parting shot, before my guardian angel returned, the demon took away my first-class seat on the flight to Phoenix because I was a day late. I couldn’t have cared less. I was finally going home to my lovely wife and adobe home. That was all that mattered. Besides, coach was only partially full, and I had three seats to myself.

We may never be able to prove 100 percent that the shipwreck we found was
Mary Celeste.
In a court of law, our evidence would be labeled circumstantial. Still, we are confident the shipwreck found in the coral is she, for a number of reasons.

Alan Guffman of Geomarine Associates in Nova Scotia coordinated the scientific testing of the wood and ballast stones. The process of rock geochemistry and radiometric dating is complicated, but the results proved that the ballast showed the characteristic mineralogy and texture of the North Mountains basalt of Nova Scotia.

The wood was identified as southern pine, often used in shipbuilding in New York, where
Mary Celeste
was rebuilt and enlarged. Some was white pine, which comes from the northeast United States and Canada. One piece of wood made everyone happy. It was yellow birch, which comes from the maritime provinces, including Nova Scotia.

It was all coming together.

James Delgado, noted marine archaeologist and director of the Vancouver Maritime Museum, identified the copper sheathing as Muntz metal, a yellow alloy of three parts copper, two parts zinc, a substance that came into general use as hull protection against shipworms after 1860.

We were getting closer.

While the artifacts were being analyzed, I tackled the job of researching other potential wrecks that might have run onto the coral of Rochelais Reef. We had to prove we hadn’t found the wrong wreck. I hired researchers here and in Europe to scour the archives. Insurance companies cooperated, particularly Lloyd’s of London. No stone was left unturned. No records of shipwrecks were ignored. The results came back positive.

A ship named
Vandalia
had indeed met her end in Haiti a hundred years ago. But she had run aground at Port-de-Paix, a bay sixty miles from Rochelais Reef, and she was later pulled off and scrapped. The only other wreck that was recorded in the same time zone was a steamship that burned in the port of Miragoane twelve miles away. The extensive research project proved conclusively that
Mary Celeste
was the only ship known to have run aground on Rochelais Reef and stayed there.

Allan Gardner, John Davis and his ECO-NOVA team, and I could now say with a great measure of confidence that the grave of
Mary Celeste
had been found. The ghost ship’s story has been drawn to a fitting end.

PART EIGHT

The Steamboat
General Slocum

I

Never Again
1904

“THESE DAMN CORPORATIONS,” PRESIDENT THEODORE Roosevelt thundered, “are just a means of hiding.”

Attorney General Philander Knox contentedly puffed on his pipe while Roosevelt raged. He was used to the president’s mercurial temperament—in time he would calm and come to the point.

“They have all the benefits of man without the guidance of a conscience,” Roosevelt noted. “Trusts and corporations—they’ll bring this country down.”

Knox stared at the president. He was not a large man—five feet nine, 165 pounds—but he carried himself like a giant. At this instant, his face was flushed with anger, and the eyes behind his wire-framed spectacles were blazing. Roosevelt’s hair was dark and short and formed a small point near the center of his forehead. His hand was tugging the right side of his bushy mustache.

“I agree, sir,” Knox said.

“The Knickerbocker Steamboat Company,” Roosevelt said, “are just organized murderers.”

“Uh-huh,” Knox said.

“I want you and the secretary of commerce and labor to travel up to New York,” Roosevelt said, “and find the parties responsible for this disaster—then prosecute them.”

Knox glanced at the president. The color was seeping from his cheeks as he calmed down. He watched as Roosevelt sipped from a glass of water.

“Mr. President,” Knox said evenly, “I think that would fall under New York State jurisdiction.”

Roosevelt spit a partial mouthful of water across the desk. “We are the federal government,” he said loudly. “We’re in charge here.”

“Very good,” Knox said, rising from his seat in the Oval Office. “I’ll contact the secretary and make arrangements to leave tomorrow.”

“Philander?” Roosevelt said, as the attorney general opened the door to the office.

“Yes, sir,” Knox said easily.

“Knock some heads up there for me,” Roosevelt said, smiling.

“As you wish, sir,” Knox said.

JUNE 15,1 904, THE PRIOR DAY

Captain William Van Schaick leaned against the chart desk and scratched the date into General Slocum’s log. Thursday came with overcast skies and light rain, with the temperature hovering around eighty degrees. Toward Long Island, Van Schaick noticed the sun peering from the clouds—once the haze burned off, it should be a fine day.

Van Schaick was tall and lanky, six feet tall, 170 pounds. His blue uniform was clean and pressed but faded some. The gold braid around his armpits was showing signs of tarnish. The fresh white flower stuck in his lapel appeared slightly out of place—like a new saddle on an aged horse.

His employer, the Knickerbocker Steamboat Company, continued to cut costs, and lately Van Schaick had been thinking more and more about transferring to another line. Few, if any, of his deckhands had experience—in fact, their primary skill seemed to be the ability to work for slave wages—and
General
Slocum itself needed work that the company seemed unwilling or unable to afford.

Turning on his heel to glance from the window, Van Schaick felt a softness in the deck that signified rot. He turned back and noted this in the log.

REVEREND GEORGE HAAS stood on the Third Street pier and stared up at the ship. The graceful twin-decked excursion boat was finished in white both above and below and seemed easily capable of carrying the thousand plus passengers that had signed up for the trip. As pastor of St. Mark’s Lutheran Church, Haas presided over a congregation of mainly German immigrants that numbered nearly two thousand. Today was to be an outing for the Sunday school students and whatever parents could attend. The trip was scheduled to take them from the Third Street pier to Locust Grove on Long Island for a day of picnicking and fun. Haas smiled as the band began to play Martin Luther’s “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God.”

Haas had no way to know the horror he would soon experience.

THIRTEEN-YEAR-OLD JOHN TISCHNER stared at the coins in his hand as he stood in the line at the refreshment stand aboard ship. The fried clams smelled good, but Tischner’s mother had packed him a tin pail with a pair of liverwurst-and-onion sandwiches for the noon meal along with a slice of chocolate cake for dessert. The pulled taffy held his interest for a time, but by the time he reached the head of the line, he had settled on a scoop of strawberry ice cream. It was a strange choice at 9:25 in the morning, but it was a day of celebration. He handed the man at the counter a few coins, then received his change and the ice cream. Enough for another scoop on the return trip.

Things were looking up.

VAN SCHAICK ORDERED the whistle to blow, signaling five minutes until they shoved off, then called down to the engine room to order steam.
General Slocum
was built in Brooklyn in 1891 and measured 263 feet with a 38-foot beam.

Powered by a single vertical-beam engine constructed by W. A. Fletcher Company, she was supplied steam by a pair of boilers fueled with coal. A pair of sidewheel paddles with the name of the vessel in ornamental letters on the outside propelled her. Twin stacks vented the smoke into the air. Strung along the upper deck on each side were a half-dozen lifeboats on davits. The paint on the lifeboats was chipped and flaking. Originally finished with a white hull and a hardwood finish on the upper decks, the ship had been repainted with a white-on-white motif that was now showing stains from hard use. Still, all in all, she was a graceful vessel.

“HURRY,” HENRY IDA said to his sweetheart, Amelia Swartz, “they’re leaving.”

Swartz increased her pace along the pier, but it was difficult-her dress boots were laced tight, and the boned corset pinching her waist made deep breaths almost impossible. Twirling her parasol, she made her way to the gangplank. Ida was overdressed for summer, but he had little choice—he owned only two suits, both wool. His only concession to the heat had been to leave the vest at home. Pushing‘the straw boater back on his forehead, he switched the wicker lunch hamper to his other hand and started up the ramp. In three minutes, General Slocum would pull from the pier. Forging through the crowd, he found a spot for them on deck.

DARRELL MILLET PRIED the top off a wooden barrel containing glasses packed in straw. The head steward needed the glassware at the aft refreshment stand immediately. Filling his fingers with the glasses, he made his way aft. Six trips later, the barrel was empty, and he dragged it to the forward storeroom. Finding a spot amid the paint pots and oil lamps, he balanced it on a couple of overturned pails, then shut the door. The straw was dry and smelled of the prairie.

Captain Van Schaick blew the whistle one last time, then ordered the gangplank retracted. Calling down to the engine room for steam, he placed the drives in forward and steered
General Slocum
from the pier. More than one thousand passengers were now under his care. The band began to play “Nearer My God to Thee.”

PORTER WALTER PAYNE entered the crowded storeroom. Making his way to a workbench, he began to fill a pair of oil lamps. Suddenly the ship rolled from side to side from the wake of a passing barge. Payne spilled some of the fuel onto the floor. After finishing the fueling, he twisted the metal caps back on the lamps. Carrying them over near the door, he paused to light a match out of the wind. Touching the match to the wicks, he tossed the match over his shoulder, then adjusted the flames. With a lit lamp in each hand, he walked onto the deck, then aft.

Paint fumes and spilled fuel were the recipe for disaster. The burning ember from the tossed match was little more than the size of a pencil lead, but it was enough. The fumes from the paint hung low over the floor, mixing with the smell from the spilled fuel. The gas ignited with a fuzzy blue flame. At just that instant,
General Slocum
hit the second set of wakes from the barge. As the ship rocked from side to side, the precariously placed barrel tipped forward and spilled the straw into the almost extinguished fire. Red and yellow points of fire streaked skyward.

CAPTAIN VAN SCHAICK was staring forward when he saw a puff of smoke from a porthole in the forward storeroom.

“Fire,” he shouted.

Then he ordered his second in command, Marcus Anthony, to round up a few sailors to man the hoses. They were five minutes from Hell’s Gate.

Reverend Haas was ladling clam chowder into bowls for his young parishioners when a sailor ran past, tugging a rubber fire hose. He prayed the man was just going forward to wash the deck, but deep in his heart he knew different. Turning his head from side to side, he tried to locate where the life jackets were stored.

“My command for an experienced sailor,” Van Schaick shouted.

His employer had saddled him with a crew consisting of untrained day laborers and general miscreants, and it was little wonder. The economy was in high gear, and unemployment was at its lowest level in twenty years. To compound the problem, just two months before, the United States had taken possession of Panama, and many able-bodied seamen had headed south for the higher wages. Workers were hard to come by, and the Knickerbocker Steamboat Company was not noted for paying high wages. Van Schaick looked down to the deck—it was chaos. He watched as one of his deckhands strapped on a life vest and jumped over the side.

“Turn on the water,” Anthony yelled back.

The forward storeroom was completely ablaze. At that precise instant, the cans of paint exploded and blew the door to splinters. Deckhand Brad Creighton twisted the brass knob that fed water from the pumps in the lower hold to the fire hoses. He watched as the rubber hose expanded and filled. Halfway down the deck, along the outer walkway, the aged rubber burst. The broken end of the hose began to flail around the deck like the body of a severed snake.

Henry Ida broke the rusted lock off the locker containing the life jackets and began to hand them but to the passengers. The canvas on the vests was old and moth-eaten, and several of the jackets burst open as soon as he grabbed them. Rotted cork littered the floor. Helping Amelia into a jacket, Ida tried to tie the straps to hold it tight. The straps broke off in his hands.

“If we have to go into the water,” Ida shouted amid the growing pandemonium, “you will have to hold the vest on.”

Amelia Swartz nodded. Her face plainly showed the fear she was feeling.

“If we become separated,” Ida said, “just swim for shore. I’ll meet you there.”

“Form a bucket brigade,” Marcus Anthony shouted, “and hook another hose to the spigot.”

This was day laborer Paul Endicott’s first day on the water. His trade was that of an apprentice cobbler, but times were so good that people were purchasing new shoes instead of having the old ones repaired. His work was slow and he needed money, so he’d signed on for a day of work.

“Where are the buckets?” Endicott asked Anthony.

“Damn,” Anthony said loudly, “they’re in the forward storeroom.”

“What should I do?” Endicott asked.

“Climb up to the pilothouse and explain our problems to the captain,” Anthony said. “Ask him to make his way to shore.”

It was bad, and Reverend Haas knew this. The fire had spread to the bow deck, and with the ship still moving forward, the flames were being fanned backward onto the mid and rear decks. All around him there was confusion—he watched as another hose was hooked to the spigot. This one burst only feet from the knob. The life vests Haas had been able to secure were rotted and deteriorating. Even so, with help from a few of the other adults, he strapped in the children and tried to line them up on the rear deck.

“We’ll try to make North Brother Island,” Van Schaick said, after Endicott’s report, “and run her aground.”

North Brother Island was three miles away.

“Full steam,” Van Schaick shouted down to the engine room.

With smoke and embers flying from her bow,
General Slocum
raced upriver.

CAPTAIN MCGOVERN WAS on his dredge boat
Chelsea.
He looked up as
General Slocum
steamed past at full speed, trailing smoke. He watched the decks as a mass of people ran aft. They piled up along the wooden railing until it gave way and nearly a hundred passengers were pitched into the water. Making his way down to his steam-powered launch
Mosquito
, McGovern headed to the site to try to rescue those swimming.

AT THE BATHHOUSE at 134th Street and the East River, Helmut Gilbey had just settled into a wooden Andirondack chair for a day of fresh air and sunshine. Seeing the burning steamer running upriver, he ran out to the street and flagged down the first police officer who happened past.

“There’s a steamer burning on the river,” he said breathlessly.

Michael O’Shaunassey looked between the buildings and caught a glimpse of
General Slocum.
Racing down the street to the precinct house, he sounded the alarm.

The precinct house emptied as the police fanned out in search of boats.

Boats were dispatched from the Seawanhaka Boat Club and the Knickerbocker Yacht Club while the police boats of the Twelfth Street substation were readied. Within minutes, the fireboat Zophar Mills and the Health Department’s tug
Franklin Edson
pulled from their docks and chased after the burning steamer. At the same time, two nearby ferryboats diverted from their runs to comb the waters for survivors.

VAN SCHAICK WAS captain of a dying ship. His crew’s inexperience, combined with the shoddy fire hoses and a myriad of other problems, had proved to be
General Slocum’s
undoing. His decision to run at full speed for North Brother Island had not helped matters any—the winds had fanned the flames into a near maelstrom. Followed by two dozen boats, Van Schaick ran his command hard aground.

JOHN TISCHNER WAS trembling. His day of fun and frivolity had turned into a horror that his young mind could not comprehend. Tears streaked down his face as he tugged at the straps on his rotting life vest. At that instant the ship’s keel struck earth, and Tischner was tossed to the deck. Peering up, he could see that the paddle wheels were still spinning wildly. Crawling through the legs of the panic-stricken adults, he made his way to where the railing had broken away and rolled into the water. As soon as the life vest met water, it became waterlogged and pulled him under.