Page 140 of In the Pursuit of Haven
I froze at the implications. Our tour guide friend stopped in front of another door and glanced back at us with an arched brow. “This would be the way to Bowditch’s basement. What are we looking for?”
“A relic.” I tried to concentrate on the problem in front of us. “It’ll be something really, really old.” My nerves were rubbed raw.
My grandfather had killed Luther’s brother.
No wonder Haven didn’t want anyone to know where I came from—no wonder Jessie tried to keep it from me after he found out.
Small towns didn’t forget the sins of the fathers. And still, the ones I loved most should’ve told me… somehow!
I clutched the map, trying to concentrate. Davey shoved the door open. A regular basement met my eyes with cute uneven cobbled floors and cobbled walls and a cobbled ceiling—yeah, scratch that, there’s nothing regular about this basement.Rusted pipes ran overhead. They would’ve been cut off from their source if they’d originally belonged to the Bowditch house.
“Where is this thing?” Davey asked.
No idea. I glanced down at the map, wondering if there was another clue that we hadn’t noticed before. There were two pictures on either side of the cartouche bearing the Salem inscription—one was the wharf where we’d found the first clue with the compass, and on the other side, the second picture was a lighthouse on an island.
Why was everyone online saying they couldn’t figure out where that picture was? That was my island! This map was made in 1804, so it matched how the first lighthouse would’ve looked on Baker’s back in the day with the two light structures attached to the top of a two-story building.
However, I couldn’t beabsolutelysure that was what I was seeing. For someone who was known for bringing accuracy to map making, wouldn’t Bowditch have made the island appear more like… Baker’s Island? He sure loved to shade his drawings.
The island came off as steep and scrunched together with even more odd shading on the crags. “I’m not sure if there is another clue on this map,” I said, “only that none of the pictures are all that accurate. This is maybe Baker’s Island?”
“Hmm.” Jessie stared down at the map. “I’ve seen this thing hundreds of times in my lifetime. I’ve never found any inconsistencies. No one has…”
“The shading on that island looks like the paint splattered on the floor,” Davey said.
Jessie and I both glanced down. Sure enough, that same odd pattern that Bowditch had used to shade the island was right below our feet. “That has to be it!” I cried.
Bending down, Jessie pressed his palms against the stone.
Nothing happened. The cobbles weren’t giving way to Jessie’s increased pressure.
Past experience told me this wasn’t going to be easy. My attention went back to the map. There was a thirty-one next to the picture of the island—that was a latitude marker; I found an explanation about Baker’s Island’s coordinates under the cartouche; the beam from the lighthouse was pointing northeast; and the whole thing was surrounded in water—waves and waves of curly, shaded water.
Bowditch used water—he worked with it, measured it, lived on it—what if he’d decided to use what he knew best?
I pointed at the splattering of paint. “That’s the island, and we need to add the ocean,” I said. “Let’s get that pattern on the floor wet.”
Jessie glanced up quickly. “How?” He laughed slightly, and I knew what he was thinking.
Ugh, no! He was not turning this basement into a urinal with what he dubbed his nature survival skills.
Davey had a thermos. I stole that. My fingers scraped over the lid as I tried to muscle it open.
“Oh, not like that!” Davey stole his drink back. “It’s got a catch,” he explained, almost apologetically, before he popped off the lid. “You want me to pour my hot chocolate over this paint?”
“Over that pattern.” I nodded. “Yes.”
He emptied the steaming brew over the shaded painting. The hot chocolate gathered before it started to stream through the maze of the strangely shaped cobbles against the ground, just as I’d hoped it would. The liquid led us through the room until it gathered into a pool to highlight what had once been an invisible X camouflaged against the wear of the stony ground.
“There!” I pointed.
Jessie dropped to his knees, first trying to tug up the stone, and when that didn’t work, he pressed down. Immediately, the X punched the cobbles down like blocks, disappearing through the other side of the floor like a Jenga game. The steaming liquid seeped down the holes.
I let out a shout of shock. It was here. I knew it was! The fact that we’d discovered yet another Relic never ceased to amaze me. I joined Jessie on the floor as he reached inside the sunken X. He lifted out a brass compass with the sign of a serpent artistically rendered across the front.
“What is that?” Davey asked. “The treasure?”
“A Relic,” Jessie said. I studied the intricate thing, immediately seeing that the letter embossed in its side was another “O.”
