The Old Cape House (18 page)

As he opened the door, Hestor stood before him, the
handkerchief around her neck stained with drips of vomit. Her face and body were wet with sweat.

“Ezra! You must go to Abigail Doane’s house.” She sat down on a chair just inside the door. Gasping for air, she finally spoke, “I warned everyone…about that girl…living with Abigail.” She hissed, “She’s …evil!”

Ezra did not like this woman in his house. She had a reputation
for a loose tongue, and today she emanated a dreadful stench.
Irritated but calm, the constable said, “Now, my good woman, please control yourself. Would you not be more comfortable outside on the bench?”

Ignoring his question, Hestor continued, “I think the girl is dead and her newborn is missing.” She shook her head back and forth in disbelief. “There is so much blood. I fear the worst has happened. I fear that wickedness is upon this village.”

“Madam, you must leave and go home. I will investigate this so-called evil and will not have need of your service.” He took hold of her large upper arm and led her to the door. Ushering her out, he added, “I will inform you later of what I discover.”

Hestor turned to face Ezra. “Well, if you ask me....”

“No one is asking you anything, woman. I will see for myself
what has happened,” and with those words he closed the door behind her.

The simple housemaid, growling under her breath, straightened her corset and smoothed her skirts. Mumbling with indignation, she stepped away from the constable’s house, eager to find the ear of someone else.

Present Day – July 12

CAPE COD

LOUIS SALINGER HAD BEEN AT HIS OFFICE
in Boston for most of the week and missed the hurricane on the Cape. His mailbox contained the results of various tests he’d ordered on the fragments that were found in the Caldwell’s backyard. He ripped open the envelope and impatiently unfolded the official document. It read that the bone fragment was indeed part of a human skull, most likely an infant, and along with the two vellum pieces, it dated back to the 1700s. A smile broadened across his face as he returned to his desk to call an old friend.

***

Neil Hallett, according to those who knew him, had every right to his quirkiness. After all, he was connected by a thin stretch of the imagination to a famous local legend about a woman named Maria Hallett. He was known around town for his continuous bragging that he was related to the ‘Witch of Billingsgate’. His house was a small Cape on Goody Hallett Drive, in Eastham, and across the front of his garage was a quarter board that read,
Whydah
. He spent hours
hovering over his computer, searching eBay for anything about her
legend.

He was placing his final bid in an online auction, with only sixty seconds left to post his price, when the call from Salinger interrupted him. The phone rang four times before he finally picked it up. He answered with a quick, “Hello? Oh, hey, Salinger, what can I do for you?” He frowned as someone else placed a higher bid and his time ran out. Rubbing his baldhead in frustration, he leaned back into his
swivel chair. “Who found what? Where?” he grumbled into the
receiver.

Turning away from the computer screen, he gazed out the
window behind his desk. “You don’t say! Why yes, I’d be very interested in taking a look at them.” He spun back to his desk and wrote down the Caldwells’ address.

***

On the third day after the storm, our power returned. The sun shone bright against a deep blue sky. I had just finished raking the last of the shredded leaves and branches from the backyard when I heard Brian call out, “Mom, Mr. Salinger is on the phone.”

It’s about time, I thought, dropping the rake. I casually glanced down into the cellar as I walked past it. That’s when I saw it–the top half of a shiny small disk. I stopped and stared. It beckoned me to pick it up. Impulsively I climbed in to retrieve it.

“Mom! Telephone!” Brian yelled again.

I clutched the circular object in my hand. “I’ll be right there.” Climbing up the stone steps of the cellar, I couldn’t take my eyes off what looked like a gold coin. As I hurried into the house I wiped it clean on my shirt and thought about what I’d tell Salinger, or if I should even tell him about the coin. I slipped the disc into my jeans pocket as I answered the phone.

“Mr. Salinger, nice to finally hear from you. What did you find
out?” I fiddled with the coin in my pocket. The information coming through the other end of the phone was good news. “I see. Yes, you can come by tomorrow. We’ll be home. See you then. Goodbye.”

As soon as I hung up the phone, I raced to look for Paul. I found him at his drawing table. “Hey, what’s up?” he asked.

“That was Salinger on the phone, he said he’s coming over
tomorrow.” I plopped down into the lounge chair by the glass doors.
“He said the skull and vellum were definitely from the 1700s.” I
glanced over to the dirt surrounding the cellar and then held the coin up for Paul to see. “Look what I found.”

“Where did you find that?” He walked over to me, took the gold coin and gave a little whistle. “This looks real.”

“It sure does. I was just walking past the hole, and it shouted at
me to come and get it.” I touched his arm. “I know we weren’t
supposed
to disturb anything, but I couldn’t help myself. Do you think we
should tell anyone? What if there’s more down there?”

Paul examined the coin. “I wonder what the laws are about
found treasure. Do we get to keep it?” He went over to his drawing board to look at the coin under a brighter light.

***

By 9:00 am the next morning, Neil Hallett and Louis Salinger were drinking coffee over the tailgate of Sallinger’s truck in the back
parking lot of the local donut shop. Other commercial vans and
trucks were parked alongside them. Hallett was looking at the two pieces of vellum inside the plastic baggy.

“What do you make of the letters?” Salinger asked.

“Well, I’m kind of partial to the Hallett/Bellamy story, and these letters could definitely fit their names. I just don’t understand why they were found in Brewster, and not around Eastham or Wellfleet, where Maria was supposed to have lived.” Neil shook his head. “Did they find anything else besides this and the skull?”

“Not as far as I know.”

Hallett sipped his black coffee. “There’s never been any physical
proof that there even was a Maria Hallett, just speculation and
stories that were passed down from generation to generation. But I know she was real. My grandfather told me about her when I was a kid.” He stood taller and looked Salinger right in the eye. “I know her story is true, and I’ve got the name to prove it.”

 “I’ve only heard about it in the Cape Cod Gazette,” Salinger picked up the baggy, and added, “…and that pirate museum in Provincetown. So what did your grandfather tell you?”

Hallett grabbed the vellum. “He said Bellamy was coming home
to Maria the night of a terrible nor’easter. His ship wrecked near
Marconi Beach, and everyone died, except for a dozen survivors.
Two pirates were found innocent, but the rest were hanged in Boston.” Hallett leaned against the tailgate of his truck. “All the old salts of Cape Cod say Sam Bellamy was never found.”

He handed the vellum back to Sallinger. “The rest of the legend is about Maria. She was distraught when Bellamy failed to return to
her, as he’d promised he would. When her baby died, she felt
abandoned and then cursed all sailors who sailed by the Cape Cod coast.”

“Nothing like a woman scorned,” Salinger muttered.

Hallett twisted his mustache. “I want to believe those letters
could stand for Maria Hallett and Sam Bellamy, but I just don’t know for sure. The location isn’t right.”

***

Meanwhile, two cars down from Sallinger’s truck, a bespectacled
young man was sitting in his car with the windows open. He
stopped eating his powdered donut when he overheard the conversation about the Hallett legend. Brushing the white powder from his dark shirt, he got out of his car and casually walked over to the two men.

“Excuse me,” he said. Extending his hand out, he introduced himself, “I’m Andrew McNutt, a reporter for the Cape Cod Gazette. My editor would be very interested in what you’ve been discussing. Legends around the Cape are always newsworthy.”

Hallett and Salinger exchanged quick glances.

McNutt asked, “Do you think I could interview you for a story?”

Salinger looked at the reporter. “Sure, I’ll talk to you, but you’d have to get permission from the property owners before you print anything.”

Hallett looked worried. He’d had bad experiences with
neighborhood newspapers. A while back, a reporter had written a human-interest
story about the local characters and had poked fun of him and his
lineage.

Salinger continued, “I guess a little publicity would boost my reputation, but as I said, the Caldwells would have to approve any news articles.”

McNutt thanked him and followed them to the Caldwell house. Neil Hallett did not look happy.

***

Three vehicles pulled into our driveway. “He’s here,” I yelled
out to Paul. “Remember, we’re not going to say anything about the coin.
Let’s research the law regarding found treasure on private property
first.”

“Okay,” he agreed.

“Who’s in the other cars?” I asked.

“I don’t know.”

We walked out back, and Sallinger introduced us to his friend Hallett, and a reporter from the local newspaper. Salinger explained the results and quietly added, “Do you know about the legend of the pirate Sam Bellamy?”

I glanced at Paul. “Wasn’t he the pirate captain of the
Whydah
?”

The archaeologist grinned. “Yes, that’s him. The Provincetown museum at the end of Macmillan Wharf is all about Sam Bellamy and his ship. It features an incredible exhibit of the pirate booty he’d stolen to bring home to a girl named Maria ‘Goody’ Hallett.”

My hands started to perspire, and my heart beat faster as
thoughts of gold coins, treasure and everything pirate tumbled into my head. Suddenly I connected the letters on the vellum to Maria Hallett and
Sam Bellamy. Everyone’s voices distorted into mumblings as the
men
talked to Paul about the parchment and the skull. I was
concentrating
so much on my own thoughts that I could barely hear their conversation.

“Nancy,” Paul looked at me.

I was standing still as a statue, peering downward into the cellar.

“Nancy, are you okay?”

“Huh? I’m sorry. I was just wondering about something.” I
shook my head, trying to come up with a nonchalant way to ask
Sallinger about the laws regarding found treasure on someone’s
property.

As if hearing my thoughts, he also peered into the cellar. “Whatever you find down there belongs to you as the rightful owners of the land.”

Hallett walked closer to the edge of the root cellar. “Yup, that’s a
real old Cape Cod root cellar. Small, round and built out of big
stones. Do you mind if I go down and look around?”

Paul nodded.

“Go ahead,” I agreed.

Hallett climbed down into the cellar. Paul and I watched him sift through the dirt with his fingers. He examined the iron bars of the wooden box that were still suspended in thin air and picked up a few pieces of the decayed wood.

I approached Salinger. “I wasn’t sure about showing you this,” I held the coin out in the palm of my hand. “I found it in the cellar.”

His eyes widened as he reached for it.

Hallett yelled out from below, “Well, I’ll be darned. Look what I found!”

Together we turned to see him holding up another dirty gold
coin.

“Whoa, you’re kidding!” Paul strode toward him.

“Look!” Hallett held it higher in the air.

Finding the second coin made me giddy with excitement–I could see the same expression on Paul’s face. The thought of real treasure buried on our land made me anxious for everyone to leave so we could keep digging.

The reporter began to scribble in his notebook. “How did you come upon the cellar?”

I ignored his question and joined Paul at the edge of the hole.

Hallett crouched down to dig with his hands while Salinger just stared into the bottom of the cellar.

Using his most polite voice, Paul asked, “Would you please come out of there, Mr. Hallett?”

Hallett ignored Paul’s request and dug even deeper.

Paul yelled at him. “Mr. Hallett!!”

This time Hallett stopped digging and reluctantly climbed out of the hole.

“I’m sure you can understand the private nature of this whole
situation,” Paul explained. “If word gets out there might be buried
pirate treasure on our property, no matter how small it is, we’re going to be in for some rough days ahead.” He looked directly at the reporter. “Mr. McNutt, your article could make my land and home a dangerous place for my family. Every weirdo will want to come here and dig for treasure, even if it is private property.”

My excitement now turned to concern.

Sallinger also looked distressed.

McNutt was not convinced by Paul’s request for confidentiality. “This is a real scoop for me; I have to write the story. I promise not to
reveal the exact location, or print your names, but I have a
professional duty to share this with my readers.”

I wondered why Salinger had to invite this reporter to join him? We don’t need any other problems.

“Okay, just a small piece–nothing sensational,” Paul replied.
“But if
you mention our names or this address, I’ll sue you and your newspaper.”